


The Tower (Inverted)

by TK_DuVeraun



Series: The Tower (Inverted) AKA The Elves Win [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Adventure & Romance, Ancient Elvhen, Bad Lore Interpretations - but fun ones, Blood mages gonna blood mage, Catharsis, Evanuris OC, F/M, Fools in Love, Found Family, Lots of OCs - Freeform, No DA4 speculation, Occasional Dark Themes, Rating is for dark themes not sexy fun times, Scuttling the Dread Wolf, That's love not FWB, The elves win
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-02-19
Packaged: 2019-10-03 18:00:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 29,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17288759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TK_DuVeraun/pseuds/TK_DuVeraun
Summary: Kirtida is the Second of Clan Lavellan and resident Lorekeeper. She's dedicated her life to compiling different versions of the same legends of her people and speculating on what may have lead to the differences. She's a scholar, not a fighter; Kir had no idea what she was going to do when she answered Divine Justinia's cry for help, only that she couldn't donothing.Hopefully her penchant for doing the right thing gets her more allies than not. The first one being a Tevinter Blood Mage isn't a great start, but her patron goddess is Arthiel, the Goddess of Inspiration, so maybe he'll turn... not evil? Kir doesn't think so, either.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, welcome! For the most part this story is full of characters to whom nothing bad ever happens (and will continue to not happen), but the piece as a whole will contain evocative scenes of depression, grief, the affects of red lyrium corruption and other unpleasant things. That is the reason for the rating and each chapter will have relevant warnings.
> 
> Additional lorebuilding for this AU can be found [on Tumblr here](https://tk-duveraun.tumblr.com/tagged/arthiel-au), but everything story-relevant will come up in the story, so please don't feel the need to do homework.

Wind pulled at Kirtida’s scarf and whispered the coast’s secrets against her skin. The _vallaslin_ on her left hand and the magic crystals in her bracelet pulsed with wind magic. She held back a wince as that made the green rift-sealing mark in her hand ache.

“You okay there, Wings?” Varric asked.

“Yes, thank you. There’s a lot of magic on the wind. It’s resonating with me.” With her walking-staff planted on the slick road, Kirtida started towards the beach. “I can see some wreckage from here. The Bloodmoon, if Josephine is right.”

“She normally is,” Cassandra said, speeding up to walk at the fore.

“I find it interesting that your magic is so responsive,” Solas said. “It seems the combination of foci together make them more sensitive as a whole.”

“According to Papae, I’ve always been sensitive,” Kir said. She hopped onto a row of slick stones, using a touch of Wind magic to stabilize her slide down. At the bottom, she turned to her companions and laughed, though only Varric appreciated it.

“Let me lead the way. The scouts reported hostile magics.” Cassandra walked past with her shield held at the ready.

Though it took effort, Kir didn’t sigh. It helped that Solas gave her a smile before walking next to her the rest of the way down the slope. Her bracelets clinked against her walking staff when they made it onto the rocky beach.

There were no signs of the skirmish where she’d recruited Bull’s Chargers, but there was the distinctive shimmer of magic in the air and the sharp scent of copper. The barrier surrounded an area of debris dragged above the tide line. A campfire burned, the blue flames clearly magical in nature. A blond man sat bowed over a second figure obscured by blankets. Purple and red wisps of magic licked his shoulders before disappearing into the shimmer of the barrier. He didn’t react as they approached.

Kir didn’t move in front of Cassandra’s shield, but she did get as close to the barrier as the Seeker allowed. “Excuse me! Are you-” she slipped her notes from Josephine’s briefing out of her bracer, “Lord Sokolov? With the information for the Southern Chantry?”

“Yes.” The man’s voice didn’t sound right. Too deep, too hollow, too echoing. “But you’ll have none of it until I can cure my friend.” He moved his hand and Kirtida could see a flash of bone-white hair in his lap.

Despite leaning from side to side, Kirtida couldn’t see enough of the second person to figure out what was wrong. “I can do some healing. And I’m a passable herbalist. What’s wrong with them?”

Sokolov took his sweet time answering, the magic flaring across his back more frequently to make up for the pauses to speak. “Nug pox.”

“Nug pox?” Cassandra asked, her eyebrows and mouth twisting in confusion. “It is only sores and a fever for a week. There is no cure. There is no need for one.”

Sokolov’s head spun around and his eyes glowed red as he stared at them through the barrier. His voice sounded human and angry. “In children, yes! It’s deadly in adults. If you only intend to dismiss the danger, leave me to my magic!”

Kir jumped when Solas put his hand on her shoulder.

“We understand the gravity of the situation. However, the Seeker is correct. There is no cure,” Solas said.

“Spindleweed. Blood lotus. And a decanter made of dawn stone,” Sokolov replied. “Bring me those and I can cure her.” The barrier around him wavered for a moment and then turned opaque. He was done talking.

“Will that work? I don’t have a lot of experience with spindleweed,” Kir said once they’d moved some ways away. The scattered clumps of the plant clearly visible from their and Sokolov’s vantage point didn’t instill much confidence.

“It could be a Tevinter brew.” Solas mused. “And I may be mistaken, but I believe he is a blood mage. Perhaps the demon with which he has a pact has a means.”

Kir looked back at the barrier, but it remained grey and smokey. “How could you tell? Because he’s so powerful?”

Solas shook his head. “His voice when we first approached had a distinctive quality to it. I imagine his demon has some stake in this friend’s life, to go to such efforts to keep them alive.”

“Do we truly want information from a maleficar?” Cassandra asked. “Perhaps we should simply return to Haven.”

“Now, now, Seeker. Not so fast. Even blood mages fall in love. Let’s save his _friend_ and then you can judge the information for yourself,” Varric said. He stood with his hands palms up and an easy smile on his face until Cassandra grunted and turned back to Kir.

“It is your decision, Kirtida.”

“If we _can_ save them, we should. With all this obsidian in the water, there _should_ be some blood lotus nearby, too. As for the dawn stone…” Kir bit her lip. “Maybe someone in the camp has a bottle we can borrow?”

\---

Brilliant red-orange magic swirled in the air, now carrying the undeniable scent of blood. The glow highlighted the sharp red lines on Sokolov’s face. He finished his spell and the magic slurped into the dawn stone bottle as if it were a starving child. The pink bottle looked garish against his friend’s blue lips. The serum came out green like elf-root tea and infused the person’s skin with a healthy flush. The moment the bottle was empty, the figure gasped and coughed.

Sokolov slapped their face gently. “Oy, heathen, stop fucking around.”

His friend groaned and shifted, swinging their arm wildly. “Fall into the sea, ass.” The words were rough and followed by a loud snore.

But they worked magic of their own; Sokolov slumped over his friend with a sigh. He touched their foreheads together for a moment before standing and dusting himself off. Not that the motions did anything for the mud and muck caked onto his robes. He stood a head taller than Kirtida and eyed her entire party critically. “Good enough. I’m Lord Vasili Sokolov.”

“Hello! I’m Kirtida Lavellan-”

“She is the Herald of Andraste,” Cassandra interrupted. “We are from the newly reformed Inquisition. Our goal is to seal the Breach. Will your _information_ assist us with that?”

“Rude,” Vasili said. He made a show of buffing his nails and examining them. “I may be a blood mage, but I’d hazard to say I’ve cleaner hands than any of your White Templars. At least I’ve never made anyone Tranquil.”

Varric’s cough didn’t sound anything close to what a cough should sound like and Solas very pointedly said nothing and looked off into the middle-distance.

“Now, if we’re done with the petty accusations, George and I want to throw our lot in with you.”

“Why should we trust you?” Cassandra asked.

It was a fair question, but far less interesting than Varric’s. “Your friend’s name is George?”

“What?” Vasili looked over his shoulder. “No, that idiot’s Cakara. George is an Avarice demon. His original plan was to talk or speak to the highest bidder, but then someone tore that great hole in the Fade and he’d much rather stay in the amorphous comforts of home and not visit in person.”

Solas rubbed his chin. “He, you say?”

“Yes, he. And he is very proud of his identity, so don’t fuck it up,” Vasili said. The red marks on his face flashed with magic. He eyed Kir. “Since you’re Dalish, Her Highness will probably want to sign on as well, but after George’s tonic she’ll be out for another few hours.”

“It’d be more comfortable at the Inquisition camp,” Kirtida said. She tilted her head up the slope. “I’m sure we can find a change of clothes for you, too. Then we can discuss the details.”

Kirtida and Varric helped Vasili pack up his makeshift camp of flotsam while introductions went around. Vasili refused to provide any additional details about Cakara, even when questioned directly about her white hair and strange _vallaslin_. He said only that she would explain, at length and in much more detail than anyone could possibly care about. When all of his meager belongings were wrapped in sailcloth, Vasili’s marks lit up and he scooped Cakara off the ground as if she weighed no more than a feather.

“She lost so much weight?” Cassandra asked, her tone concerned and gentle.

“Nah, she’s still a bronto. Blood mage, remember?”

And there went the last of Cassandra’s goodwill.

Kirtida snickered and shared a glance with Solas. They fell back a few steps, so they could speak without interrupting the less-than-good-natured banter. “I’m hard-pressed to show appreciation for an unrepentant Tevinter mage, but he has a good rapport with his demon.”

“George sounds fascinating. I’ve never heard of an Avarice demon.”

“I suspect he is a Hunger demon that starves for _things_ : physical and not. He likes the name because it is something he can own, even within the Fade.”

“Oh…” Kirtida nodded. “And calling himself Avarice instead of Hunger is giving him something else he _has_.”

“Precisely. Cakara’s uniqueness, whatever the origin of it, is likely why George, and ergo Vasili, is so attached to her. That barrier was no mortal’s spell.” Solas’ head was tilted at a contemplative angle as they walked, as if he were trying to see secrets in the clouds overhead.

“I’ve never seen those _vallaslin_ before and I’ve made a point to study all kinds.”

Solas chuckled. “Indeed you have. They are unfamiliar to me, as well.”

“And even the most remote clans have exposure to nug pox. Clan Shiralen in the Western Approach has a few infected dolls they keep, uh, fresh, and pass around the children before they get too old.” Kirtida rubbed the back of her neck. “I thought it was weird at the time, why get the kids sick on purpose, but if it’s deadly otherwise…”

“Most adults won’t catch it, even if they have no previous exposure, but it seems a valid concern, considering.”

“I’m glad we were able to help.”

“As am I. These three may prove valuable.”


	2. Chapter 2

“I am Cakara Tine, Mirror Guardian. It is good fortune that we met.” Cakara knelt on one knee and presented Kirtida a long, curved dagger held horizontally with the cutting edge pointed at herself. Her white pupils seemed particularly disconcerting with the intensity of her stare.

“I’m Kirtida Lavellan, Second of Clan Lavellan.” Kirtida tried to take the dagger, but Cakara held it firm. “Erm, it’s nice to meet you?”

“No, you’re supposed to…” Cakara started as a half whisper, but then changed her mind. “You turn the dagger point to the soil, then push it down and to me. And you say ‘It is good fortune that we met.’”

Eyebrows raised, Kirtida cleared her throat and said, “It is good fortune that we met.” Careful not to shove the blade into Cakara’s bare hand, she manipulated the dagger as instructed and then smiled.

Cakara beamed up at her and then stood, sheathing her dagger. She looked over at Vasili. “See? It’s not that hard, is it?”

Kirtida laughed at the curse he gave her in response. “So that’s the ritual greeting your clan uses?”

“We’re not a clan. Amorgos is a… city-country like in the Free Marches. But an island. Anyway, usually, both people offer each other food or drink on meeting, but since I’m a Mirror Guardian, I’m offering my protection and you’re acknowledging that you’ll owe me if I save you.” Cakara stumbled over a few of the words, but with her firmly Marcher accent it could have passed as a stutter. “We say ‘good fortune’ because you might be meeting a shit person, but after the Cataclysm meeting someone is always good fortune because it means we are less likely to die out.”

“What do you have to offer the Inquisition, Cakara Tine?” Cassandra asked before Kir could formulate her own question.

Cakara flexed and her smooth limbs bulged with tight muscle. “I was raised to fight demons. I can incapacitate even a Pride demon alone, if given enough time.”

“A dedicated nug could do that,” Vasili jabbed from the campfire.

Cakara replied with an unfamiliar word, said like a curse, that made Solas start.

He blinked at her and asked a question in Elvhen, though Kir only caught a few words. Cakara turned liquid at the question and splashed against Solas, grabbing his arms. She spoke so quickly in Elvhen in return that she was in danger of biting off her tongue. Solas chuckled and responded, gently prying her hands off his arms. After a few back and forths, he nodded and returned to Trade.

“Your dialect is also rather thick, but we’ll manage when we have to. Pardon me for interrupting, Kirtida. I was simply surprised to hear that particular invective outside the Fade.”

“What does it mean?” Kir asked.

Solas gestured that Cakara could translate.

“Too stupid to possess.”

Vasili pointed at the glowing, red marks on his face. “Excuse me, _maleficar_ over here, as the Seeker keeps reminding me.”

“You let the demon in and it still doesn’t want you,” Cakara said. She and Vasili exchanged rude gestures before she turned back to Kir. “We didn’t learn Trade on Amorgos until the last hundred years or so. We’ve been completely isolated. That’s why I came to the mainland. I wanted to meet the Dalish and exchange knowledge.”

“Isolated since when? The fall of Arlathan?” The tips of Kir’s fingers felt numb and Wind magic bubbled in her chest. “You have our history? All of our history! This is… This is amazing! This is everything we’ve wanted!”

Cakara looked away and put both hands behind her back. “Well, uh, something like that! We lost a lot in the Cataclysm and what we have left is disputed. Everyone had their own patron Evanuris, so there were a lot of arguments of who did what. Still are, really, but I can tell you what I know.”

Kir touched her shoulder. “That’s fine. It’s better than nothing. Maybe you can come to the next Arlathvhen and tell everyone. I’ve never even seen your _vallaslin_ before.”

Cakara rubbed the black lines on her chin. “They’re not _vallaslin,_ just tattoos. _Vallaslin_ are…” She asked Solas for a word.

“Taboo.”

“Ah. _Vallaslin_ are taboo on Amorgos. Mother said it’s because the gods are the only ones who can bestow them, but the Elders told me it’s more complicated than that.” She glanced back at Kir. “But you can tell me about yours! I thought I knew all of the patterns, but I don’t recognize yours.”

“Let’s sit. It’s a long story.”

\---

The bronze falcon waddled across the flat, wooden table top in Haven’s pub. It flapped its metal wings to stay balanced, each articulated feather slipping against the others with quiet hissing. Kirtida’s teal Force magic glowed around it. She kept her right palm pointed at the bird, the smooth, yellow lines of her _vallaslin_ bright as she powered it. “When I found it, it was just a bronze egg buried in some ruins on the coast near Seere. Papae couldn’t sense any magic in it, so he let me keep it.”

Cakara held out her hand and the bronze bird climbed on, able to find more stable footing when it could wrap its claws around something. She lifted it to her eyes. “This is incredible. How could he not realize it was magical?”

“The egg was perfectly smooth and inert. It, er, hatched the first time I did magic as a kid. No one’s been able to get it to turn back into an egg. Some of the Keepers at Arlathvhen have tried, too.” Kir squeezed her left hand into a fist. “I could make it fly before, but the mark in my hand messes up my magic and I don’t want to risk breaking it.”

“Now that’s a paragon’s creation if I’ve ever seen one,” Varric said. He had a book open-faced on the table where he was taking notes. “Is it just a toy?”

“That’s what I thought! Either June made it, or it was made in tribute to him, but he’s never really been associated with raptors. And then there’s the detailing on the feathers. Even the down is fully articulated, but then the face is…” Kir gestured to it.

“It’s just the pattern of your _vallaslin_.”

“Exactly. I thought maybe June took on new attributes just before Fen’harel locked him away with the others, so I focused my studies on him during the late Empire period.” Kir nearly bounced off the bench in her excitement. “He took on _something_ , or some _one_. Arthiel. She was his apprentice for years and years and her influence made all of his other apprentices create master works left and right.”

The bronze falcon opened its beak and screamed, the sound ringing against its metal guts. Cakara laughed and patted its head.

“Some of the stories say that he had her elevated - like Ghilen’nain - but there aren’t a lot of mentions of her, so most clans don’t accept her as part of the pantheon. She was one of Andruil’s hunters before apprenticing with June. That’s where her falcon form comes from. Her second form was a fennec, for getting inside great magical creations and working on the insides.” Kir put her left hand over the left side of her face, her fingers squished together and pointed down. “Her alternate _vallaslin_ is a sharp design shooting down like this: like a fennec jumping down, though it’s not as obvious as the wings.”

“Daisy would love to hear this,” Varric said.

“Oh, I could write her?”

Varric chuckled. “Only if you have time, Wings. Seeker’s already glaring at us.”

“It’s the middle of the barren night! If she wants to fight demons in the dark, she can do it alone,” Cakara said. She set the bronze falcon back on the table and pulled Vasili’s cloak around her shoulders. “I’m going to go sleep spitefully well.”

“That’s mine!”

Vasili made a grab for her, but Cakara danced out of reach easily. “It’s cold out. George will keep you warm.”

“But he’ll complain the whole time!” Vasili shouted even as she darted out of the tavern. He muttered a curse in old Tevene and took a drink of his mead. “Shameless barbarian.”

“You and Snowflake are pretty close, eh?” Varric looked at Vasili from over his glasses, his hand still writing in straight lines without him watching. Kirtida leaned in so she could better-watch his expression. She’d been too polite to ask herself.

“She owes me her life,” Vasili said. He shrugged and scratched the falcon under the chin. It chirped at him.

“I don’t know. I think it’s a little more than that.”

“I love her. Congratulations. You managed to guess that from the fact that we’re always together and cohabitating. Surely, you have the wisdom of ages, Tethras.” Vasili rolled his eyes.

Kir’s magic faltered at the blunt confession and her falcon sat before going lifeless on the table. She wrapped it in its carrying cloth and stuffed it down the front of her sash.

“Just asking a question… I thought it was strange you call each other ‘friends,’ considering.”

“Titles are cheap, Deshyr.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mild body horror of the Red Lyrium variety. Depressive thoughts and attitudes.

Luna hung high over Haven. Its light reflected off the snow and made Kirtida’s forest green blanket look ghostly pale. She was out on the village outskirts, staring up at the sky, wrapped to the chin in warm ram’s wool. Though his footsteps were light, Kir still heard Solas’ approach in the near-silence. She smiled up at him.

“I take it they were all suitably impressed by your falcon?”

“I’m always surprised when people treat it like a real animal and try to pet it.”

Solas turned one hand palm-up. “Whomever ensorcelled it spent a long time studying raptor mannerisms. The lifelike movements are what prompt the response.”

“That makes sense.” Kir pulled the blanket over her nose for a moment to regain feeling in it. “Did you know about Amorgos before we met Cakara?”

“I had heard of it, but I assumed it was lost to time, as every other Elvhen city from that time.” He clasped his hands behind his back.

“And the cataclysm she mentioned?”

Solas hummed, his breath fogging in the night air. “Magic was once much stronger, in Thedas. Its loss would be devastating for an island that relied on magic for resources.”

Kirtida leapt to her feet, her blanket pooling on the ground. “That’s it! It has to be! She called herself a Mirror Guardian. Mirror! Eluvians! They got their resources from the eluvians and when they closed, they had nothing! Oh, this is brilliant! I need to ask her.”

Solas chuckled. “I’d advise waiting until morning. I believe she and her Tevinter have already gone to bed.”

Kir wilted. She picked up her blanket and shook off the snow and dirt. It still brushed the ground, even wrapped fully around her. “That’s true.” Kir glanced at Solas. “He loves her, you know.”

“I didn’t, but it doesn’t surprise me.”

“I didn’t think a Tevinter blood mage could love anyone, let alone an elf.” Kir snaked her arm out of the blanket and tucked her cold ear-tips into her scarf. “I guess they were just monsters in my head. Like Orlesians say about the Dalish.”

“It’s always more difficult to find fault in an individual than in a group.”

Kir’s nose scrunched up. “I still don’t like Cullen.”

“You’re still professional when you work with him; that is what matters.” Solas smiled and raised his eyebrows at her. “But I did notice a certain lack of enthusiasm whenever the Ambassador mentions approaching the Templars.”

“If the mages aren’t enough, I’ll do what needs to be done. I just hope, you know, that they are.” She chuckled and pulled the blanket up over her nose. She kept talking, even though her voice was muffled. “Thank you for being less… ‘Wah, the Dalish are wrong about everything’ lately.”

“Is that how it came across?” Solas tilted his head towards her. “Before you, my experience with the Dalish was them… attempting to find the one true history.”

“That’ll never happen. Even in Tevinter, where they’ve had basically the same ruling class for a long time, their history all over the place and inconsistent. Nevermind the things they edited out of the records intentionally.” Kir pulled the blanket down and let out a long breath, watching it fog up as if she were a dragon. “Besides, people are attached to their stories, their heroes. Who am I to tell them they’re wrong? If I somehow find proof that Arthiel never existed, does that change what I’ve accomplished in her name? Will it make my magic less effective? The stories made me who I am. They didn’t need to be true to do that.”

“That’s an admirable view to have. I have a friend, Wisdom, who might like to speak with you sometime.”

Kir turned to face him, so full to the brim with excitement that her vallaslin flashed with magic. “Can you do that? Let me speak with a Spirit of Wisdom? Keeper said there were rituals… But they’re dangerous, you don’t know what you’ll contact and even then, the cost of the lyrium alone!”

Solas laughed. “It would take some arranging. After we’ve sealed the Breach, certainly, but yes, I can arrange it.”

“I’d love that! I’ll still have to wander around Thedas sealing the little rifts, but the Inquisition should be done with me once the Breach is sealed.”

“I wouldn’t make any long term plans, just in case.”

“Too late for that. I want to go to Amorgos and get a message case like Cakara. I could travel to other clans and contact Keeper immediately! Can you imagine how much more efficient our trade will be?”

“Message case? I’m afraid I didn’t see…”

Kir held her hands about 40 centimeters apart. “It’s a case this big. A cylinder. When she puts a message in and closes it, it disappears and reappears in a similar case back on Amorgos. Her elders have it and she writes them every few days.”

“Hmm. Very clever. It sounds familiar.”

“Something you’ve seen in the Fade?”

“Perhaps.”

\---

“You truly can’t fight at all?” Dorian asked. His robes were still dripping as they climbed the stairs out of the dungeon they’d initially found themselves in.

“I’m a scholar, not a hunter.” Kirtida’s bracelets jingled as she brushed a stray lock of hair out of her face with the back of her hand. 

“I suppose I thought it was just a part of being Dalish.” Dorian swung his staff and launched a barrage of fire a guard before he could raise the alarm.

Kir swiped her right arm through the air and the guard’s body flung itself into a wall and out of their way. “Not a bad assumption to make, what with how we have to fight the  _ shems _ just for the right to live on our own lands in peace.”

“Ah, yes, I suppose that was a bit insensitive, wasn’t it?” Dorian asked as he opened the door in front of them.

They were on a raised platform, though what it was raised  _ above, _ Kir had no idea. Regardless, Venatori agents stood far too close to the edges, making it easy for her to push them to their deaths with her combination of Wind and Force magics. She clapped her hands together after the resounded thuds and clanks of armored bodies hitting the floor below. “A bit. Shall we continue?”

“Hopefully there are people we can free who can help us fight our way through the castle. I don’t like using fresh bodies, but-”

“You’re a blood mage, too?”

“A blood- No! I’m a necromancer! I prefer them  _ without _ blood, thank you very much.” Dorian huffed and pushed his way forward down the stairs to the second section of dungeon. He might have had more to say, but he froze, holding up his left hand. “Do you hear that?”

Kir turned until her ear was pointed down the stairs. At first, she heard nothing. Then, a strangled, choked sob.

“Give him back, demon…”

“That’s Cakara!” Kir shoved past Dorian and took the remaining stairs two at a time. “Cakara! Are you-” But the word ‘alright’ died in Kir’s throat.

Cakara’s shock of thick, white hair was brittle and red as rubies turned to strings. Even her veins were red under her milk-white skin. Instead of reaching out of her cell, she pleaded with the one next to her, heedless of Dorian and Kir’s presence. 

“Kirtida Lavellan. You were not alive before,” Vasili’s mouth said, though the voice wasn’t his. It was deep and hollow. The sound rang oddly, as if it were coming from the bottom of a well. Vasili’s once-fine Tevinter robes hang in tatters on his emaciated frame. His eyes were gone; green flames stared out at Kir from pits as black and empty as the night sky. If the sky hadn’t been completely swallowed by the Breach. 

Kir’s stomach dropped at the thought. She stepped up to the cells. “George?”

“I searched far and wide within the Fade for you. How have you come to be here? No. I do not want to trade for that. Take my human back to Amorgos. Her Elders may be able to cure her.” George turned Vasili’s head to Cakara, who had her face pressed against the bars separating their cells. The tears on her cheeks were thin and as red as berry juice. Like her hair, her pupils were bright red. Vasili’s casual declaration seemed a thousand years old.  _ I love her. Congratulations. _

Words refused to leave Kir’s mouth. What did one say? What could one say, when faced with such pure despair and resignation paired together?

“None of this has to happen,” Dorian said. Whether because he was level-headed or because he didn’t care about Vasili and Cakara, he showed none of the cracking on his soul that Kir felt. “Alexius sent us into the future. If we can find him, I can reverse the spell.”

George took Cakara’s hand and stood, pulling her up with him. He watched Dorian unlock their cells, though his hand wiped the corrupted tears from Cakara’s face. “It will always have happened. You may be able to restore my possessions.”

“We will!” The words were like like a single stone against a waterfall, but Kir threw it against the rushing agony as if compelled. She grabbed Cakara’s free hand. “We’ll bring him back.”

Cakara nodded in slow motion, as if she were in a dream. She pulled away from Kir and George, sleeping-walking to the guard’s weapons rack. She tossed a great sword over her shoulder like it was a twig and took a halberd for herself, a heavy, silver ring clinking loud against the haft as she tested her grip. Kir dodged away from the sword, but she needn’t have bothered with how George plucked it out of the air. Vasili’s hand tightened on the hilt and the blade flared to life with a spiderwebbed pattern of enchantments.

Dorian cleared his throat. “Right then. Shall we find Alexius?”


	4. Chapter 4

The sounds of Haven celebrating blew across Kirtida like a warm breeze. She breathed them in and tried to relax. She glanced at Dorian and he gave her an empathetic, pained smile that wrinkled his forehead and pulled awkwardly at his mouth.

“Feels a little hollow, doesn’t it? Even with the Breach closed,” Dorian said.

Kir opened and closed her left hand. “It’d be a little better if my magic was back to normal, but the Mark is still interfering.”

“If you’ll let me, I’d like to study the Mark when we have time.”

Kir sighed and rubbed her eyes. “If we have time. The Elder One, a demon army, the assassination of the Orlesian Emperor-”

“Empress.”

“Whatever, she’s a _shem_ whose Empire oppresses the People, what do I care?”

“You must be really hungry,” Cakara said. She shoved a handpie at Kir. “You’re usually a lot nicer. I’m glad I thought to bring you something.” Despite the cold air and snow on the ground, Cakara still wore only her light, leather armor. Her unnaturally white skin was prickled with red flush from the cold.

Vasili had appeared with her, also in his armor, but sensibly wearing boots, gloves and a heavy, fur-lined cloak. He had two tankards and offered one to Kir. “She insisted.”

“Thank you.” Kir grabbed the cup itself so the hot wine could warm her hand.

“Sokolov! You!” Dorian said.

Vasili raised an eyebrow at Dorian as he drank from his tankard. “Yeah? You saw me in the future, didn’t you? I knew you were slow, but I didn’t expect you to be surprised to see me.”

“Not using blood magic to-” Dorian lowered his hand and took a visibly deep breath. “Nevermind that, you were an _elf_ in the future!”

Kir opened her mouth to argue, but then closed it. She’d been so wrapped up in Cakara’s corruption and the fact that George had been in control of Vasili’s body that it hadn’t even registered as noteworthy that his ears had been pointed, his eyes bigger and his frame more lithe. “...You were an elf. Was that George’s doing?”

Cakara rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. She rubbed them together for warmth. “He’s always been an elf.”

“No one asked you, barbarian,” Vasili hissed. He saw Kir and Dorian’s rapt expressions and made an annoyed sound. With a huff, he straightened and brushed non-existent dirt off the bottom of his tabard. “Fine.”

With ceremony and much flourishing, Vasili handed his tankard to Cakara - who immediately drank from it. After excessively fluttering his fingers, Vasili removed his right glove and a large, silver signet ring. The moment it left his finger, the illusion disguising his eyes and ears winked out. “Satisfied? It’s an illusion. Father’s doing. I didn’t even know until _someone_ saw through it.”

Cakara giggled. Vasili shot her a glare and replaced the ring and his glove.

Dorian twirled his mustache. “My, my, the nouveau riche Sokolov twins are also elf-blooded. Imagine the scandal.”

“Yes, well, Terenti’s gone and joined the Venatori. I think our reputation’s already ruined, but thank you for the ringing reminder of your racism.”

“I, well,” Dorian stumbled over his words and adjusted the ties on his vambrace. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Care to dig that hole any deeper, Pavus?”

Magic crackled between them, but before Dorian could formulate a properly witty response, the chantry’s bells clanged and shattered the festivities. Cullen ran past the group, barking orders to soldiers and support staff alike.

Cakara dumped out the rest of Vasili’s wine and tied the tankard onto her belt. “I hope that’s not the demon army.”

Kir shook her head. “It’s too soon. George told me everything he knew.” She shook out her right wrist and started pulling magic through her focusing crystals. When they were glowing, she started towards Haven’s gate. “It was months before the demon army was ready to march.”

“Doesn’t sound like him,” Vasili said, following a step behind. “What did you give him in return?”

“Your life,” Kir spat. “I’d rather not relive it right now.”

The screech of metal on metal and the unmistakable sound of armored bodies hitting the ground greeted them at the gate. Kir spun up twin threads of Wind and Force magic through her _vallaslin_ and around her hands, ready to blow away whatever was on the other side. Next to her, Vasili drew his sword, Cakara crouched with her bo staff and Dorian stood with a fireball hovering above his left hand.

“I can’t come in unless you open!” The voice sounded young and on the verge of cracking. Kir was already signalling for the guards to open the gate when Cakara lunged in front of her.

“That’s the voice of a demon!” Cakara shouted, even as she dashed through the half-open gates. Her staff swung through the form of a young man, who teleported past her and in front of Kirtida.

“I’m Cole. I came to warn you. To help. People are coming to hurt you. You probably already know.” The demon was in the form of a young man in tattered clothes and a floppy hat. It reached out for Kir, only stopped by glowing blade of Vasili’s great sword.

“We know what you are, demon. Return to the Fade.”

The demon ducked its head to look under the blade. “I’m not a demon! I’ve come to help.”

A gasp of pain escaped Vasili and his sword wavered. “George says it’s Compassion.”

“I’m Cole. The Templars have come to kill you.”

\---

The avalanche crashed toward Haven as fast as Corypheus and his false arch demon sped away. Vasili grabbed Kirtida by the wrist and Cakara by the back of her armor. The light from the blood marks on his face was blinding. The snow and ice slammed into them like a Pride demon, launching them forward and down. Cakara lead the way, hitting the ground bo staff first. The reinforced wood snapped, but not just her staff: the platform shattered as they hit it. As they fell into the mine shaft, Kir pulled and spun magic out of her bracelets. Wind howled in their ears as the ground approached, but the trio hit a pillow of Wind and Force magic instead of stone and abandoned cart tracks.

The magic deflated, dropping all three the remaining ten centimeters to the ground. Kir laid still, catching her breath and willing her pulse to slow. Vasili released her wrist and got to his knees, moaning and groaning dramatically. He patted Cakara down for injuries. “Frozen idiot. How about you let the one in _armor_ go first, next time?”

Cakara coughed and punched Vasili in his armor’s gap in the armpit. “I’m a warrior. I don’t stand back.”

Vasili growled and threw his fancy cloak over her. “Learn to. We’re fighting an army, not single demons trailing out of mirrors one at a time.”

Cakara sputtered and then muttered in Elvhen. Kir caught a few words she was pretty sure were curses and something that might have been ‘Falon’din leave your soul to rot,’ but her Elvhen wasn’t great. When Vasili stood up to examine the mine, Cakara rubbed her face against the furred collar and tied the cloak tight.

“By the way, Kir, George says you have to let him examine the Anchor when we get out of here.” The clang of his sabatons against the old tracks echoed down the passage as Vasili explored.

Kir pushed herself up with both hands and then dug into the sash around her waist. Her bronze falcon was unharmed, though she’d have a nasty bruise on her stomach. She stowed it and brushed as much dirt and snow off as she could. Her headscarf was gone, torn away by the avalanche. With a grimace, she tied back her hair as best as she could with a piece of twine. It wouldn’t hold long, but it was better than nothing. She sighed. “What’s George going to trade for that?”

Vasili paused and red light bounced around the mine as his marks flashed. “He just said, ‘I remember’ and refuses to elaborate.”

The flinch was so violent that Kir’s muscles protested. “Alright.” She stood and shook out her ankles. As unfamiliar and uncomfortable as the boots were, she was glad to have them. “Now what?”

“We get out. And soon. The air is stale in here.”

“Isn’t that good?” Kir asked. “The snow won’t be able to get in a bury us.”

Cakara paused in her perusal of the shards of her staff and looked at Kir. “You don’t have a lot of experience with caves, do you?”

“No?”

She tossed the broken pieces aside. “Stale air means no fresh air.”

“It doesn’t feel great, but I didn’t think you two were sensitive to that.”

Vasili came back and shook his head. “It means we’ll suffocate if we stay too long.”

“But there’s plenty of air.” Kir blinked and glanced between the two of them.

“Not all air is breathable.” Cakara said. She bunched her hands up in Vasili’s cloak and rubbed her feet on the opposite calves trying to warm them. “Look, I might be terrified of mirrors, but the only thing that comes close to being as dangerous as the sea is caves.”

If not for Vasili’s solemn nod, Kir would have thought she was joking. Neither of those things seemed particularly dangerous or frightening, but she’d grown up in the deserts and plains of middle Thedas, so she could be wrong. “Okay, well, then, what do we do?”

“This is a dead end. The hole we fell through,” Vasili pointed his thumb up, “is too small to be where they first cut into the mountain. George speculates this is where they got the materials for the Temple of Sacred Ashes and this was just where they lifted them out. So we follow the tracks out.”

Pulling her shoulder wrap tight, Kir nodded. “After you, then.”

“You said the stale air feels bad? When we hit a fork, you’ll have to tell us which direction feels less ‘bad.’ That should be the path out. George doesn’t know enough about- Ouch, shut up- about dwarven mining to tell just from the cart tracks.” Vasili rubbed his temples and muttered under his breath about recalcitrant demons.

Kir shoved her hands into her sash both to keep her hands warm and to rub the falcon’s wings. As a child, she’d worried she’d smooth out the fine engraving, but after years of nervous handling, it was as beautiful as the day it hatched. She followed as closely in Vasili and Cakara’s footsteps as she could, but they were both a head taller than her. Vasili was only part-elf, but how was Cakara so tall? Were Amorgan elves just taller? Why? The island barely had enough resources to sustain itself, so it was unlikely that they ate better than the Dalish. Kir mulled over the question.

She spun up her Wind magic, so it would be ready when they reached a fork, though it made the Anchor pulse and ache in her palm. Her companions slipped into combat stances before Kir even noticed the danger. The shrill laugh from the despair demon startled her so badly that she tripped backward, arms pinwheeling to catch herself. She landed hard on her back and the tension in her left hand snapped, energy shooting out of the Anchor. A green ball of magic hovered in the air and tore at the demon until not even wisps remained. Kir stared at her palm in horrified silence until Vasili and Cakara each pulled her up by an arm.

“Come on. We can worry later. The sky was bad before the avalanche; we need to hurry if we want to get out of here before the storm hits.”


	5. Chapter 5

“Can you two be a little less weird?” Varric asked.

“What?” Cakara nearly fell off Vasili’s hart when she contorted to look at Varric. She only remained in place because he grabbed the back of her cloak - her own, finally - and held her in place.

“Would you focus? I’m not pulling you out of a bush again.”

“Yeah. Less of that. I only get so much suspension of disbelief and you two use up all of it with your backstories.” Varric put a hand on his chest as he narrated. “The traumatized warrior-guardian from a mysterious elven island-”

“I am not trauma-”

“You broke the ambassador’s mirror,” Vasili interrupted.

“And the half-elven, Tevinter magister with a heart of gold,” Varric finished, as if they hadn’t said anything.

“Heart for gold, more like,” Cakara said, elbowing Vasili.

“Oh, so you want to walk?”

Kirtida muffled her giggle with the back of her hand and struggled not to turn around watch their antics. Magic was pulsing through the Anchor and while the feeling had gotten stronger for the last bit, it was weakening again. They were riding in the wrong direction, but the trees were too thick to stray from the game track and change direction. Kir hoped they could swing back around without going too far off course. According to Leliana’s reports, there were only two rifts left in the Hinterlands and Kir wanted to…

Kir’s roan hart stopped with her thoughts. They hadn’t gone the wrong way. The rift was right in front of them. The resonance had weakened because someone else was sealing it. Two someones else. They were elves, but tall, like Vasili and Cakara. The woman had dark, auburn hair in a long braid and held a glowing sword up, tip pressed into the rift, as if soldering it shut. The man’s hair was black and stood straight up in springy twists as he held out his staff and added his own magic to the rift. Their armor was similar to each other, but wholly unfamiliar to Kir.

At least until Cakara leapt off Vasili’s hart and sprinted at them. They only just sealed the rift when Cakara jumped on the woman and enveloped her in a tight hug. “Elders! You didn’t say you were coming to the mainland!”

The woman laughed and passed Cakara over to the man, who spun her around as if she didn’t weigh a thing. She sheathed her sword. “We wanted to surprise you. And not listen to complaints that we were ‘too old’ to be travelling.”

The man tapped Cakara on the nose and kissed her cheek as if she were a child. Kirtida was baffled. The two elves barely looked older than Leliana with their unwrinkled skin and commanding presence, but after staring Kir could see just a hint of grey in their hair. Still, it seemed odd for them to be the esteemed Elders Cakara kept talking about. Kir’s father looked ages older than them. When she realized how rudely she’d been staring, Kir slid off her hart and jogged over to them.

With a small flask of Dalish mead from her sash, Kir held out her hands in greeting. “I am Kirtida Lavellan, Inquisitor. It’s good fortune that we met.”

The woman threw back her head in delighted laughter. “Lovely!” She offered a pink, spun-glass bottle with a thin liquid inside. “I am Aquila Meshurok; it is good fortune that we met.”

The man stepped up and touched Kir’s hands, as well. “And I’m her husband Juniper.” He winked. “Be careful with that; it’s very strong.”

“I will. That’s just… Dalish wine. Drink it warmed. It’s not much, but Cakara said it’s more about the gesture than anything and I don’t really have a lot of space to carry things-”

“It’s very courteous of you, Kirtida,” Juniper said. “We were on our way to Skyhold to offer our expertise when we came across this rift.”

“Not even Chuckles can close rifts and he’s the Fade expert,” Varric said.

Aquila and Juniper exchanged smiles before she answered. “We’ve been practicing magic a long time, but perhaps the middle of a copse of trees isn’t the best place to discuss it.”

“You can head directly up to the castle,” Kirtida said. “You’ve travelled so far already. We’ll return shortly, there’s just one more rift in this region I need to seal.”

“Not that one in the waterfall was it?” Juniper asked. “It was a bit trickier, but that’s because we hadn’t figured out the best way to sew up the Veil.”

“No one’s gonna believe this, either,” Varric muttered, patting himself down for something to write notes on.

“You really can seal the rifts… Can you teach our mages how to do it?”

The couple tilted their heads at identical angles and their mouths curved into the same expression, though Aquila quirked an eyebrow while Juniper made a helpless gesture with his hand. He spoke. “The prerequisite knowledge is too much, I think. And if not that, we don’t have the words in Trade to explain the technique.”

“Oh! That’s alright!” Cakara said. She was bouncing on the balls of her feet, her cloak swishing and swaying about. “Solas, the Chuckles Varric mentioned, he speaks Elvhen. Terrible accent, but good enough!”

“It’s probably bad because the stick is so far up his ass it’s obstructing his mouth,” Vasili drawled.

Aquila smirked. “I take it you’re Vasili, then?”

\---

Five sets of hooves clattered into Skyhold’s outer courtyard. Kirtida didn’t want to dismount. She could spend days riding and listening to Aquila and Juniper tell her about Amorgos and their legends and their version of the old Dalish tales. The way they spoke made her feel like a child again, curled up in her father’s lap as he softly told her stories until she fell asleep. Maybe that was why they were called the Elders: they were just so parental. Even Vasili hesitated to sass them.

Hesitated, but still did. Undoubtedly because of how much it upset Cakara, but Kir was too amused to point it out. Though Varric did give her a wink when they made eye contact after a particularly scathing comment about Aquila’s extreme undercut.

But the stable hands were already approaching, so Kir resigned herself to the adventure being over. She’s waving to Solas when Juniper jumps off his horse and races across the courtyard.

“Solas!”

“Juniper?”

They clasped hands and Juniper patted Solas on the back. They spoke in rapid Elvhen, but aside from ‘You’re alive!’, Aquila’s name and a few scattered words, Kir didn’t understand what they were saying. Aquila was more reserved in her greeting, holding out her hands in a ritualistic greeting wholly unlike the Amorgan one. Solas held out his hands in the same way and they bowed to the same depth in unison before making polite contact.

Kirtida startled when the stable hand tapped her leg and offered her a hand down. She laughed accepted the hand. “Sorry about that.”

“It’s no trouble, your Worship.”

She sighed at the title, but let it go. “I wasn’t expecting the Elders to know Solas. He didn’t really know about Amorgos, after all.”

Cakara looked up from where she was rubbing the stiffness out of her legs. She blinked and glanced over at them. “This isn’t the first time they’ve left the island. They were the ones to teach me your language. They would have to meet some people.”

“You’re not… interested? Curious?”

“Not to agree with Vasili-”

“Barbarian!” he shouted from across the courtyard, though how he’d heard, Kir had no idea.

“But Solas is kind of an ass. I’m this close to making him a head shorter the next time he tries to passive-aggressively ‘correct’ my pronunciation. And not the one on his head.” Cakara shook out her ankles and pulled her cloak tight. “Hopefully they make him stop.”

“I didn’t think he was that-” She cut herself off as a page with Josephine’s device approached. “What is it?”

“The War Council wants to meet with you regarding a judgement, your Worship.” The page bowed over nearly in half. “Her Lady Nightingale especially wants you urgently.”

With a last, wistful glance at the Elders and Solas, Kir nodded and followed the page back to the castle. Servants and soldiers bowed as she passed, though the visiting nobles gave her nods at most. Was a polite smile too much to ask for? To be treated like a peer? Insults and derision were worse, but that didn’t stop the mindless obeisance from being uncomfortable.

Josephine greeted her with a simple Lady Lavellan, Cullen a sharp Kirtida (she knew he was trying to ingratiate himself to her, but the familiarity wasn’t helping) and Leliana gave her a sharp nod. Leliana put both hands on the war table and leaned forward. “There was an assassination in the castle while you were away.”

Kir jumped and the Anchor flared in her hand. “A what?!”

“I want to recruit the assassin. Not one of my people noticed him and he would have gotten away if Bull hadn’t returned with his Chargers at just the right moment,” Leliana continued.

“Who was murdered? N-not Dorian-”

Josephine made a note on her board. “A minor Orlesian noble: Comtess Desroches. She, ah, lead a slaving ring out of Churneau.”

“My spies discovered that just before finding her body.”

A sharp knock of metal on wood sounded before the door opened and Cassandra entered with The Iron Bull following her. He carried an elf bound at wrist and ankles by the back of his collar. Kirtida winced at how the fabric cut into his neck.

“Is that really necessary? You couldn’t let him walk?”

“He’s a weasely one, Boss,” The Iron Bull said.

“No, he’s right. I could have gotten away if they let me walk,” the elf said. He had red eyes and _vallaslin_ , but between his chubby cheeks and cheerful grin, Kir doubted that.

“Arlo Vaharel, at your service, Second of Clan Lavellan,” he said. He waved his bound wrists at her.

“You assassinated one of my guests and you want a job?” Kir asked.

“She was a really terrible person. Even for a _shem_. And Clan Vaharel spent the last twenty years in Tevinter.” Arlo wiggled in The Iron Bull’s hold and suddenly his wrists were free. He offered Kir his hand.

The Iron Bull pulled Arlo out of Kir’s reach and shook him. “How does he keep doing that? I tied the knots myself.”

Leliana giggled behind her hand. “I like him, Kir. He reminds me of an old friend.”

Josephine cleared her throat and walked around the table to stand at Kir’s shoulder. “Comtess Desroches never removed her mask in public. Few know her face or voice. Should you… decide to… recruit the young man, we can stage a judgement of the late Comtess for her practice of slavery in order to hide her murder.”

As Kir stared at Arlo, he wiggled his fingers and grinned. He looked like nothing so much as a big, blond puppy. “Are you sure he’s the one that did it?”

“I believe he may be the best assassin and worst liar I’ve ever met. He’s perfect,” Leliana said.

“And I can cook Dalish desserts!”

Kirtida absolutely did not take the last into consideration before making her decision. “Recruit him.” Absolutely not. She would never think of it.


	6. Chapter 6

The Anchor crackled and spat green sparks out of Kirtida’s palm as Cakara’s Elders examined it. Juniper held her hand in both of his and prodded the Anchor with different kinds of magic. Aquila sat nearby, her sword sheathed and spread across her lap, the aquamarine pommel stone glowing softly. They spoke to each other in Elvhen, but even then only half sentences with aborted gestures and nods filling in the gaps. Without the metal plates, Aquila’s armor looked nearly identical to Juniper’s. His cut was looser and instead of the eagle emblazoned on Aquila’s chest, he had a glowing set of tinker’s tools. Kir tried to read, but the half-familiar words and pull of magic kept stealing her attention. 

The sun had just begun to set when Juniper nodded to his wife and released Kir’s hand. They both sat straighter in their chairs. He clasped his staff and spoke. “There are three options. The first is untenable: leave the ‘Anchor’ as it is, which will eventually result in the amputation of your arm. Or worse.”

Kir clenched her left hand into a fist. Her magic flared and she channeled it into her bracelets before it could lash out in its instability. She nodded.

“The second option is to remove it and with it your ability to seal the tears in the Veil. This would be substantially easier on you personally, but where you can seal a tear in a few moments, it takes both of us together the better part of day. That will decrease in time, but it is a major consideration with how many are spread across Thedas.” He passed the staff between his hands and then gestured to Aquila, who took over.

“For the last option, you have to understand the true nature of what this ‘Anchor’ is. When magic was stronger, it was common for mages to make a static version of complicated spells. Why perform three days of rituals when you can simply activate an enchanted object to enact the spell?”

“Like the elvhen artifacts Solas has been activating?”

The Elders exchanged a look. Aquila narrowed her eyes for a moment, but said, “I would have to see one to be sure, but perhaps.” She held her sword up to Kir, pointing to the engraving on the crossguard. “This will cast a Frost spell in a cone in front of it when activated. It draws power from the focusing crystal and the castor. The ‘Anchor’ is one such spell. However, it requires a great deal of magic to activate. Whomever made it attached a large store of magical energy that was transferred to your hand with the spell itself.”

Kir pushed Wind magic through her  _ vallaslin _ under the Anchor, but it sputtered and floundered. “I don’t feel any more powerful.”

Juniper gently closed her fingers over her palm. “That is because the magic store is attached to your flesh, not to your magic.”

Aquila nodded. “We can move the spell so that it doesn’t interfere with your marks and properly bind the magic to you. It would be difficult to use it for any spell other than tearing or repairing the Veil, but possible.”

“Would it still hurt when I use it?”

“No!” Aquila’s eyes were wild and she asked her husband a sharp question. He shook his head. She sighed. “If we’d known it hurt, we would have started on the road.”

“No it- Not always. Just when I use it.”

Neither looked particularly comforted. Juniper squeezed her hand. “It would feel like casting any other spell. The only difference is that you would feel a boost to your power as it drew from the magic store. To use the store for other spells would feel like diverting a river of your mana. Possible, but taxing, even with practice.” With the barest touch, he pulled her hand closer to himself. He traced lines from her  _ vallaslin _ down her arm. “Through practice, you’ve created riverbeds your magic flows through to easily cast-” he closed his eyes for a moment, “-Wind magic through your tattoos. Other spells you channel through your focus bracelets. It would be like trying to cast those spells through your left hand.”

“I think I understand.” Kirtida bit her bottom lip. “I don’t want Thedas to rely on me and my magic, but that’s not really my choice anymore. I’m the Inquisitor. I’m the rallying point to fight against Corypheus. I’ve already seen the stupid, green hand splashed on people’s shields. It’s almost uglier than the eye.”

“Almost,” Aquila said with a wink.

Kir laughed. “Almost.” She sighed. “The last option really sounds like the best one.”

“You don’t have to choose right away,” Juniper said. “We can temporarily disable it so that it doesn’t hurt while you decide.”

“No. I’m the Second of Clan Lavellan. This responsibility isn’t one I chose, but it’s one I have. I’ll keep the Anchor and see this through myself.”

Aquila put her arm around her shoulders and kissed Kir’s forehead. “We’re proud of you.”

“Yes,” Juniper agreed. “If you’re ready, we’ll have dinner and start tonight.”

“Thank you. I am.”

\---

The bronze falcon swooped and glided around the Herald’s Rest, far above the patrons’ heads. Kirtida followed it with her left palm, her Wind magic finally flowing properly. Cakara and Dorian watched in rapt fascination. Vasili tried to look unimpressed, but his neck kept snapping unnaturally to the side - undoubtedly his demon wanting another look. The Iron Bull split his attention between the bird and trying different knots on Arlo’s wrists. Surprising no one, Solas was absent from the display.

Without warning, the falcon changed course with a sharp dive out of Kir’s control. She grabbed her wrist with her right hand and pushed magic through her bracelets and into the Wind  _ vallaslin _ , but still the bird fell. It fluttered its wings and with a quiet rustling of bronze feathers on Aquila’s shoulder. At the tavern entrance, both she and Juniper exclaimed and laughed delightedly at the falcon. It began to pick at her armor, in an attempted grooming. Aquila was scratching it between the neck feathers when she stepped up to Kir’s table.

“Sorry about that, Aquila! It’s never done that before. It’s the first time I’ve been able to make it fly since-”

“Don’t worry. I love her.” Aquila pursed her lips and the falcon pressed its beak against them in the facsimile of a kiss. “I’ve always been fond of raptors. My name is Aquila, after all.”

“So you  _ are _ named after the Old Tevene word!” Dorian leaned halfway across the table and pulled on his mustache.

“It means eagle in my mother’s native language, which may well be the root of Old Tevene.” She coaxed the bird onto her hand with a mixture of nonsense-baby talk and Elvhen. She held it out to Juniper.

“If it were bigger, it’d be a perfect recreation,” Arlo said with wonder in his voice and one hand tied behind his back.

After a little more coaxing, the falcon hopped to Juniper’s hand. He scritched under the metal bird’s chin. “Actually, it’s a pygmy falcon. This is simply what size they are.”

“Saw a few of ‘em on Seheron,” The Iron Bull agreed. His tone was tight and edged with annoyance as he pulled Arlo’s free hand back into another knot.

“Falcons can be that small?” Kir leaned across the table with Dorian, her elbows planted in the wet space between cups.

“It’s more wonderful than I’d thought. And it must have some kind of internal power source for it to have flown over to Aquila,” Dorian said.

“She’s a clever little one. Knew a friend when she saw her,” Aquila said. Without fanfare, Aquila shapeshifted into a real, live replica of the bronze falcon. She screeched at it. It screeched back. Aquila flew up to Juniper’s wrist and rubbed beaks with the metal bird.

Kir gasped and clapped her hands on her cheeks. “I’ve never seen it do anything like- Oh this is amazing! Have you seen one of these before?”

Juniper chuckled and lowered his hand and both birds onto the table. “A few times, yes. There you go, little one. Dear, are you going to change back?”

Aquila screeched and beat her wings at him.

“I’ll just drink your mead when it comes, then.” He tapped her beak and she bit him before flying off the table.

Instead of transforming back into an elf, Aquila shifted into a red fox, fat with her winter coat. She hopped up onto Juniper’s lap and put both front paws on the table. Cakara shoved Dorian out of the way and patted Aquila’s fox form with both hands, rubbing the ears, smoothing the fur and scratching under the chin. 

Vasili yanked her back by the back of her armor. “Have you no sense of dignity?”

“She likes it!” Cakara insisted, though the fight she gave Vasili was token at best. She laughed and bumped shoulders with him.

“Barbarian,” Vasili muttered. He reached for his cup, but discarded it on finding it was empty. He took a long pull from Cakara’s instead.

Dorian straightened his robes and sat with perfect posture. “A shapeshifter, as well? My, you’re a woman of many talents.”

Aquila licked Juniper under the chin before returning to her chair and transforming to her natural form. “I’ve been practicing magic a long time. And you’re not too bad yourself, Dorian. Necromancy was always impressive, even when magic was stronger.”

Like the peacock his family was named after, Dorian preened under the compliment.

With both hands, sans rope, on the table, Arlo asked, “So can you teach me how to do that?”

The Iron Bull sighed with his entire body. He slouched and pressed a hand over his eye. “A mage! No wonder. Damn cheating mages.”

Juniper patted him on the shoulder. “That’s the secret. He’s always using magic.” He pointed to his face and turned his finger in a circle. “His eyes are red when it’s active and yellow when it’s not. You were too busy looking at his hands and feet.”

The Iron Bull growled a curse. Across the tavern, Krem shouted, “Language, Chief!”

The table descended into laughter and much slapping of wood. Juniper scooped up the little bronze falcon before it could be knocked asunder. “Go to sleep, little one.” His hands glowed and the falcon curled up only to transform back into its original bronze egg in a flash of light.

Kir couldn’t blink and her eyes hurt with the intensity of her stare. Breathless, she said, “Even Solas didn’t know how to turn it back.”

Juniper chuckled. “Well, I hesitate to say I’m a better mage than him, but-”

Vasili interrupted his suggestive trailing off with a loud, barking laugh that startled half the tavern. “George knows you!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cue everyone making squinty eyes at each other.


	7. Chapter 7

When Vasili didn’t elaborate, Dorian cleared his throat. “Well?”

“Well what?” Vasili made an affronted noise and took another drink from Cakara’s cup.

“They want details,” Cakara said, yanking her cup back. She looked into it, saw it was empty and dropped it on the table with a clatter. She elbowed Vasili. “You could have left me a sip, at least.”

“I don’t care. I’m not going to pay for that. I’d say one of you fucks could make a deal with him for it, but I’m not going to spend all night being a mouthpiece.” He crossed his arms over his chest and pouted like a child, insolent chin-tilt and everything.

“Oh come on, you have to!” Arlo said. He leaned toward Vasili, eyes big and wide like a puppy begging for a treat. “You can’t just leave it hanging like that.”

“I’ve interacted with many spirits over the years,” Juniper said. “And Cakara’s message said George used to be Wisdom. I’m certain it’s far less interesting than Vasili has made it out to be.”

“It doesn’t have to be a blood pact, though, does it? He just examined the Anchor the other day for information.” Kir bit her lip. She sifted through her brain like her thoughts were flour, looking for something good enough for George.

After a glance around the table, Vasili shook his head hard enough to upset his hair. “Nope. Not doing it. I have better things to spend my night doing. And people.” Before anyone else could speak, he grabbed Cakara by the chin and kissed her with gusto. His vambrace clinked loud against her chainmail skirt. Krem wolf-whistled from other side of the tavern. 

Cakara shoved him away with a laugh. The flush on her cheeks was stark against her snow-white skin. She pulled on his ear. “You’re drunk.”

“If I was drunk, I’d be fucking you, not kissing you.” He leered at her.

Rolling her eyes, Cakara got up from the table and threw Vasili bodily over one shoulder. “Sorry, Kir. I need him for a few hours. Then you can try to ask George.”

“Don’t hurt yourself, Cakara!” Aquila called when she made it to the door.

“Or him, ideally!” Juniper added.

Vasili held out both hands in rude gestures as he was carried out like a sack of potatoes. 

The Iron Bull wrinkled his nose and took Vasili’s vacated spot. “Juniper’s right. If it was worth knowing, George would have stopped them and tried to get something good for it.”

“I despise merchants,” Dorian said. He took a gulp of his wine, grimaced, and then took a sip. “I’ll bargain for it later. It may not be interesting to uneducated rabble like you, but any meeting with a spirit of Wisdom is worth noting.”

Kir patted his hand. “I’ll go with you. Vasili isn’t as bratty with me.”

Aquila chuckled, covering her mouth with her hand. “Children are so rambunctious on the mainland.”

“Come now, there’s no need to be so reductive,” Dorian said. He sniffed.

“I’m just sayin’, the one that dragged their lover off was one of yours,” The Iron Bull added. He took a drink from his tankard. “Not that I don’t want a go with her. Have you see her thighs? Could crush someone’s head. The demon resistance is a nice touch.”

“George doesn’t seem like the sharing type,” Kir said.

Dorian choked on his wine. “Kirtida!”

“I’m twenty-six!” Kir laughed at his offended expression. “I’m Second of my clan. I teach the teenagers how to safely engage intercourse. Stop looking so shocked.” She took a pointed drink of her mead. “Do you have any idea how many ‘historical texts’ are simply thinly guised erotica? Does being nice mean I can’t also be worldly?”

“Well said, Kir,” Aquila said. She winked. “Meanwhile, when I was young, certain parties that shall remain unnamed-”

“Juniper,” said half the table.

“-assumed that having been in the army meant I was experienced in sex.” She pinched her husband’s cheek.

“Are you ever going to let that go?”

She winked. “Not a chance.”

“Very cute,” The Iron Bull said, “but let’s back up. Army? Who was Amorgos at war with? Dolphins?”

“Who are Dolfins?” Arlo asked, suddenly intent.

“Dolphins are a sea animal.” Juniper cupped his hands on the table. The magical focus in his staff glowed with magic. He pulled his hands back to reveal an illusory sea with sleek animals jumping in and out of the water. “They’re particularly, ah- Aky?”

“Frisky.”

He laughed. “I suppose. Particularly frisky with other species.”

Kirtida leaned in until her nose nearly touched the illusion. Arlo and Dorian joined her. She glanced up at Juniper. “Can you show us other sea animals?”

“I’ve read about dolphins, but they don’t particularly care for the water around Minrathous,” Dorian said. He wiggled his fingers at the illusion, feeling the magic.

Juniper straightened his back and expanded the illusion to cover a full quarter of the table. He adopted a proper lecturer tone and explained sea animals to the half-drunk people at the table. Kir was staring at an otter in awe when she heard The Iron Bull say, “Nice try, but I’ll ask again.”

“I would be disappointed if you didn’t,” Aquila replied.

\---

Skyhold’s disrepair pulled Kirtida’s heart the rest of the way out of her stomach and through the broken flagstones. She hadn’t known that the wing housing Vasili and Cakara’s room was missing a chunk of wall and most of the roof. A path had been cleared in the hallway, but only one of the half-rotted doors had been replaced. With the way the wind swept through the hole and pierced Kir’s clothes made it clear  _ why _ . Their door was warm to the touch when she knocked.

“Come in.”

They sat together on the bed with their backs against the ornate headboard. Cakara wore a dark-blue nightgown so loose in the shoulders it had to belong to Vasili. Her eyes were locked on a glass music box in the shape of a strange bird that she held in her lap. Next to her, Vasili wore simple trousers and a shirt the same color as the nightgown, with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, showing off the marks from his blood pact. He examined a fancy metal cylinder; it had fine gold and silver filigree in the shape of wings and gusts of wind. Cakara’s communication case. Maybe if Vasili had one of his own…

Kir’s lip trembled. She took a deep breath. “Leliana just received a report from one of her agents in the Venatori.”

“New mission?” Vasili asked without looking.

“No, it’s-” Kir sighed and sat down on the edge of their bed. She took the case out of Vasili’s hands and set it next to him. “They know you work for me and either don’t know or don’t care that you’re a twin. They-” She swallowed and her eyes burned. “They killed your brother. I’m sorry.”

Vasili paled until his skin was the same color as Cakara’s. She’d dropped her music box, the cheery melody muffled by the thick, fur blanket. She took Vasili’s hand in both of hers. Vasili shook his head. “What? No. No, they can’t have. Fear would have- Did he- When?”

The erratic flashing of magic on his skin made Kir want to cry. “Two weeks ago.”

“How?” The word came out as hollow and rough as when George spoke through his mouth.

“End of a skirmish they just… Stabbed him in the back. Left him in the same ditch as the Orlesians. Leliana’s trying to find… I’m so sorry.”

“I…” Vasili blinked, noticing the tears streaming from his eyes. He brushed them away with the heel of his hand. “Teren can’t- That bastard can’t be gone. Who’s going to- He’s all I-”

“I’m sorry.” 

Kir made eye contact with Cakara, who nodded before pulling Vasili onto her lap. She stroked his hair and murmured to him in Elvhen. Vasili kept shaking his head and stuttering denials, even as he pressed his face into her shoulder. His arms shook and his hands fisted in her nightgown.

Biting her bottom lip nearly to bleeding, Kir stood and went to their door. “A page will bring your meals up. Leliana will keep you updated on the… The search. I’m so sorry.”

The finality of closing the door broke her. Kir fell to her knees and bit the heel of her hand to muffle her sobs. Vasili’s howl of grief was guttural and pierced the door as if it weren’t there. It made her cry harder. She hadn’t even met Terenti Sokolov. Everything Vasili had ever said had been an insult and Leliana’s reports said he had the murder coming, but she still felt like Corypheus had reached inside her and stolen something critically important. People had died at Haven. She’d witnessed that Chantry man’s last moments herself and hadn’t felt even a sliver of grief.

But the death of a cruel, Tevinter blood mage, a magister, made her want to go home and curl up in her father’s lap and sleep until it didn’t hurt anymore. She’d mourned people in Clan Lavellan, but they were friends, extended family. Maybe, maybe- Her body shook and she bit down a wail. Maybe this was the cost of friendship. She bled when they bled.

The heat from Vasili’s enchanted door wasn’t enough to hold back the cold forever. Wind bit into the wetness on Kir’s face when she stood. On the other side of the wood, his grief had eased, vocally at least. She could hear Cakara’s music box playing again, only rarely interrupted by choked sobs. Her hand lingered on the door. She tried to memorize the feel of his magic. Maybe if they could connect more, she could cheer him up a little… Later, when the worst had passed.

Lips trembling, Kir started the long walk back to her own quarters.


	8. Chapter 8

In Skyhold’s lower levels, just above the wine cellars, Kirtida found a library secreted away down a narrow hall. The door showed no signs of rot when Kir pushed it open, though the sheets covering the furniture within were moldy and moth-eaten. She rubbed her swollen, gritty eyes with her right hand, while her left blasted the room with a rush of Wind magic. The cobwebs and bad smells blew past her and through the castle until the wind dissipated naturally. The bookshelves hummed with preservation magic.

Kir brushed her fingers over the spines. Despite their obvious age, the titles were clear; she simply couldn’t make sense of the lettering. Many were in old Elvhen script, but even when she sounded out the characters, she didn’t know what they were about. She gambled on a thick tome with leaves embossed above and below the title. She flipped through the middle of the book. Thick paragraphs of spidery writing sat between careful plant illustrations and detailed maps. After kicking the moldy cover onto the floor, Kir sat on an old divan. She pulled her knees up with her and opened the book on the shelf they created.

She skimmed through the book alone, accompanied only by the sound of her own sniffling. Though it should have been impossible, Kir would swear she could steal hear Vasili’s broken cries from across the castle. She turned away from the book when fresh tears fell from her eyes. It was so stupid and selfish to mourn someone she’d never even met.

“Oh, Kir. No one should cry alone.” Juniper swept into the secret library, his robe billowing behind him. He leaned his staff against the divan and sat next to her. With his arm around her shoulders, he said, “There, now. This is better.”

She sniffed hard to clear her nose. “How did you find me?”

“Your breeze went by the kitchens. A cat was chasing it.”

A laugh gurgled out of her chest and Kir swiped at her eyes. “Really?”

“Really.” Juniper wiggled his fingers between them. “I think it caught a spider she wanted. Then I just followed the path it swept. Quite a treasure you’ve found here, but why find it? What’s wrong?”

The words pierced her chest and squeezed her heart with ghostly hands. She whimpered. “It’s nothing. I’m being stupid.”

“You don’t have to tell me, but I assure you it’s not nothing.” He squeezed her shoulders and pulled the book until it was between them. “What’s this, then?” His fingers traced over the letters and he mouthed words with a wrinkle between his eyebrows.

“Can you read it?”

“A bit. I would hazard to say it’s written in a dialect derived from pidgin Elvhen and… Classic Orlesian, maybe? Aky’s better with languages than I am; she might know.” He flipped the page, let out an ‘ah’ and pointed to the picture. “Yes, this plant is dawn lotus, though it looks rather different now, doesn’t it?”

Kir swallowed the grief in her mouth and examined the picture. “These petals are much narrower. I only know because it’s used for healing. I’m not really an herbalist.”

Juniper chuckled. “Nor am I. Much fonder of tinkering. I won’t starve in the woods and I can treat a fever, but that’s about it.” He flipped forward a few pages, explaining the plants he knew and musing on whether they could still be found in the mapped regions. Despite his claim, he knew more plants than Kir.

“Oh, felandris!” He raised his hand and made a circular gesture. “One time, when she was running around as a fox, Aky fell into this huge patch of felandris. It was taller than her! She spent two whole minutes whining and trying to turn around until I reminded her she could just change shape again.”

Kir laughed and felt like a real person until the sound died. She struggled to find words, but Juniper waited for her. “Vasili’s… twin was killed by the Venatori.”

“I certainly wouldn’t call that nothing. No reason to grieve alone.”

“But I didn’t even know him!”

“Not in person, perhaps, but your heart knows him, through his brother.”

Kir closed the book with a snap and squeezed her eyelids tight on the tears. “And I should be comforting him, not wallowing myself.”

Juniper set the book on the floor and pulled her into a hug. “It rarely works out that way, I’m afraid. Don’t worry about him for now. He has Cakara and Aky was going to check on them. You can let it out. I won’t tell.”

She pressed her face into his shoulder and cried. “I just want my family.”

“I know. I’m sure between you and Josephine we’ll be able to convince them to come to Skyhold.”

She pulled away and wiped her face. “Papae is going to be so cross he couldn’t figure out the falcon and you just walked up and made it work.”

“Do you have it with you?”

Kir nodded and pulled the bronze egg out of her sash. “I didn’t want to… wake it up again until you taught me how to make it sleep. I’m always afraid it’ll break.”

He removed his arm from her shoulders so he could cradle the egg in both hands. “She’s a sturdy little thing.” He blew over the shiny, metal surface. “Wake up, little one.” In a burst of magic, the egg transformed and left the pygmy falcon flapping its wings against his palms. It cried at him until he scratched under its chin.

“It never did that for me.”

Juniper grinned at her and a mischievous light flashed in his eyes. “Well I made her. She would act differently for me.”

“Oh,” the word took all of the breath from her lungs. The way the bird had been so affectionate with Aquila had so much more significance.

“Don’t tell Aky I told you and I’ll teach you all of her tricks.”

\---

Vellum and fabric samples covered Josephine’s desk. Kirtida had a pile of buttons and buckles in her lap. Her mind whirled with technical terms for different stitches and cuts. It was only early afternoon, but Kir felt as frazzled as her hair. She would have slumped against the desk in defeat if Aquila had been sitting next to her as a warm beacon of calm energy.

“Lady Meshurok,” Josephine said, “I’ve reinstalled the mirrors in the baths. Has Miss Tine, ah, settled enough that they will not be a problem?”

Aquila laughed and pushed away from the design she was modifying. “That’ll be a few years, at least, I’m afraid. But Juniper and I rigged a bath for her in that drafty tower of theirs. Your mirrors are safe.”

“Given the particular nature of her reaction, I must recommend against bringing her to the Winter Palace. The late Emperor was rather fond of his own reflection and I believe the Empress has not redecorated the salient areas.”

“I like her, but the mirrors would be the least of our concerns if I took Cakara. I made a deal with George,” Kirtida ignored Josephine’s flinch, “so I have to bring Vasili, but the two of them together would cause a scene. Which could be a nice distraction, if it was controllable, but they’re really not.”

“I always wondered what would happen when she realized there was no one on Amorgos with the same raw, chaotic energy she has. It should have occurred to me she’d just leave.” Aquila added a final line to her drawing and then flipped it around for Josephine. “Make these changes and the uniform is acceptable.”

Josephine lifted the vellum, but lowered it after a glance. “Lady Meshurok-”

“This isn’t negotiable.”

“These designs are Dalish-”

“And so is Kirtida. Is she the Inquisitor or is she your puppet?”

Kir pulled the design to herself while they argued. The plain sashes had been replaced with bands of braided leaves. The intricacy might have been an issue on their schedule, but that wasn’t what Josephine had a problem with. While she never would have suggested it herself, Kir loved the design and would hug Aquila fiercely once they left.

“The nobles will-”

“Fuck the nobles, Ambassador. Servants out-number them five to one in the royal palace. And them? Elves, all. All we need from the nobles is siege engines and I’m willing to bet Juniper and I could tear down the walls ourselves if we had to. We’re going to stop the assassination of the _shem_ Empress and garner support. None of you in your fancy clothes like it when Sera talks, but she’s _right_. The support comes from the people and the _people_ want to see an elf that doesn’t kneel.”

Josephine lowered her pen and turned to Kir. “Inquisitor?”

“Aquila’s right.” Bolstered by her own rebellion, Kir sat up straighter. “And I won’t wear shoes. You can have the tailor make some fancy bracers, but I’m not going to wear boots.”

“I will… inform the tailors.” She made a note. “One last thing. What are the… cultural limitations on your headscarf? It will be a challenge to make it work with the uniforms.”

“It’s not cultural.” Kir pulled off her scarf and shook out her hair. She needn’t have bothered; the moment it was free of the fabric, it poofed out in a great, black cloud. “It takes ages to treat it properly and my magic always makes it… like this.” She gave Josephine a little smile. “You can do whatever you’d like with it for the Winter Palace.”

A light sparked in her eyes, so Kir took that to mean she was forgiven. “I’ll choose an appropriate style for the venue. With a mask as a hindrance, we have many options.” She reached across her desk and fingered a few strands of Kir’s hair. “Yes, a very similar texture to my own. I imagine your magic would upset it. Do not worry; I know just how to handle this.”

Josephine slipped into her chair and pulled a fresh sheet of vellum onto her writing board. She wasn’t so undisciplined as to mumble to herself as she sketched, but the words may as well have shot out of her ears like steam. Kir glanced at Aquila, who smiled, winked and mouthed ‘well done.’

She’d already sketched three styles before remembering that Kir and Aquila were still there. “Ah, yes, that was all, Lady Lavellan. Unless you have anything..?”

Kir stood. “No, that was all. I’ll see you at the next war council.”

“Indeed. I will have a few options for you to choose from at that time.”

Once she was behind a closed door, Kir let the giggles escape and pulled Aquila into a tight hug. “Thank you.”

“Of course, dear one. It’s long past time Juniper and I did something about the oppression of our people. We hid away on Amorgos for too long.”


	9. Chapter 9

Words died in Kirtida’s throat. The heavy, silver ring burned against the  _ vallaslin _ on her palm. She should have expected this; she had the ring, so the illusions couldn’t still be hiding Vasili’s elf-blood, but seeing it still brought back memories of the False Future. She saw a flicker of green fire in his blue eyes before squeezing her own shut. When she opened her eyes, Vasili’s ears were still pointed, but his Tevinter finery was still fine and Cakara sat next to him without a hint of red outside her armor. Though her own plate was full, she picked off of his. He snatched every other bite from her fingers, grumbling about how she was a barbarian, but Kir saw through the gambit. He probably hadn’t been eating.

“You’re, erm, not looking very human today,” Kir said. She rubbed the back of her neck and fought down the nervous chuckle.

Without looking, Vasili stopped Cakara’s wrist halfway to her mouth. He stared Kir down. “I see him in every reflection.” He ate the berry from Cakara’s fingers and released her.

“I- Oh. That… explains it, then.” She swallowed and held out her hand, displaying his signet ring on her open palm. “I- That is, Arlo found it in the men’s baths.”

Vasili swatted Cakara’s hand away from his plate and turned away from her, taking it with him. He had no interest in the Sokolov ring. “Eat your own food, you Void-begotten heathen.”

Her hand started to tremble, so Kir took a deep breath. “I’m not asking you to wear it, but one day you might want every memory of your family you can get.”

“What do you know of losing family?” Vasili snarled. The marks on his right hand flashed to life and a moment later the ones on his face followed suit.

“Don’t alienate me just because you’re hurting. We all have things left to lose. Save your anger for Corypheus and the Venatori. If you stop being an ass, I’ll give you your revenge.” Blood rushed in Kir’s ears. She had only scolded children before, never a peer and never one that could tear her limb from limb. But she felt no fear. Not just because George liked her too much to allow Vasili to kill her. For the first time, she felt confident. Like Inquisitor was more than just a title in a silly Orlesian  _ shem _ game. Standing up to Josephine had shifted something. Vasili huffed and shoved an entire bread roll in his mouth so he wouldn’t have to answer.

Rolling her eyes, Cakara reached out and plucked the ring from Kir’s palm. She examined it before slipping it onto her right index finger. It fit without slipping. “I’ll keep it safe for him.”

Kir didn’t hear her over the second rush of memories from the False Future. George-as-Vasili hadn’t had the illusions  _ and _ Cakara had had a silver ring. Kir couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed earlier. The signs were everywhere. Vasili had even said it himself: he loved Cakara. At the end of the world, he’d given her the only physical piece of memory he had. Kir blinked back tears and coughed to cover her emotions.

“Right. Thank you, Cakara. I need to, um, meet with Cullen. Clan should arrive any day now and I need to make sure they’re given enough space for the aravels and… stuff.” Kir bit her lip and shifted her weight from foot to foot, ready to dash off.

Cakara shoved Vasili to the side and stood up. “I’m coming with you! I want to learn all about aravels and what kinds of resources the Dalish need. This is what I came here for. He can sulk by himself if he wants.”

\---

“Kir. Kir! Come on.” Arlo grabbed her wrist and started dragging Kirtida to the gates before he’d even finished the words.

Kir dug her heels into the dirt, to the sound of her parents’ laughter. “I’m helping my family settle in. I’m the Second; it’s my responsibility to-”

“My cousin is almost here!” Arlo pointed to the sky, where a blue and purple plume of smoke was dissipating in the wind. “You have to meet her. She’s amazing.”

Kirtida’s father was a swarthy man with a bald spot on the top of his head. He removed Arlo’s hand from Kir’s wrist and then patted her on the shoulder. “It’s alright,  _ da’len _ . Thanks to Aquila and Juniper, it’s gone much faster.” He looked over his shoulder at where Kir’s mother was explaining something to Aquila. He laughed. “Well, mostly. They’re so curious!”

“My responsibilities-”

“Include welcoming guests to Skyhold, do they not?” Juniper said. He winked at her father. “Your family will still be here. Come; I’m curious to see a cousin of Arlo’s.”

With a grumble, and feeling like a small child, Kir handed the tools back to her father and started after Arlo. He was bouncing with every step: a scarcely contained bottle of energy. He was a little hard to look at; his magic made his outline less-than-solid and it was working overtime with his excitement. She looked up at Juniper, but he just chuckled.

Just inside the gates, Kir grabbed the back of Arlo’s shirt. His clothing wasn’t as affected by his talent, so it mostly kept him from running out of the ground. Two wounded and bedraggled elves passed through the guard checkpoint, leading a single, limping, black horse. The taller elf had small ears and an ugly, fresh scar going from his temple down his cheek and ending on his throat. He was dirty and dragging his feet. The shorter one - a black-haired woman that Arlo embraced with a loud cry of ‘Cousin!’ - was tired and leaning most of her weight on an ironbark staff. 

“Oy, Knife-ear, shut him up. It’s too early for that.” The male looked up and Kir gasped. It was Vasili, some injured doppelganger. Or the one in the tower-

Kir jumped when Juniper reached into her sash and pulled out the bronze egg. He woke the falcon with a whisper of power. “Go on, get Vasili. Drag him by the hair if you have to,” he instructed.

She watched it wing away, speechless, as the female elf complained. “Get off of me, Arlo. For the last time, we’re not cousins. Stop squeezing me; my ribs are cracked.” Was Juniper going to test which of the two was the real Vasili? How would he know? Under the dirt and the scars they were…

Identical.

Kir’s knees buckled. “Terenti Sokolov!”

He straightened and brushed his hair back in a facsimile of Vasili’s slicked-back style. “Finally! Someone in this Blighted South that recognizes true nobility when they see it!”

“But you’re dead!” The words dribbled out of Kir’s  mouth before she could stop them.

“Regretfully, no,” the other elf said. She succeeded in prying Arlo off and was holding her ribs. “Ghilenan Vaharel, Inquisitor. Second of Clan Vaharel, here to offer my, gah, services.”

“Do you need help?” Juniper asked. Without waiting for a response, he approached her with his hand already glowing with blue healing magic. He pressed it into her side and she relaxed against him for an instant before catching herself and propping herself up on her staff.

“I’m fine,” she bit out.

“Let Juniper help, Ilena! He’s the best mage in Thedas.” Arlo grabbed Terenti’s arm and dragged him over. “At least help him. Ilena’s husband needs to be fit to keep up with her.”

Ilena went red at the implication that her teacher wasn’t the best mage in Thedas, but every inch of visible skin flushed near-purple at Arlo’s last comment. “He’s my prisoner, not my husband!” The last word came out as a cracked shriek.

“You couldn’t keep a nug captive with those injuries,” Terenti drawled. He seemed resigned to being manhandled, but sighed in relief when Juniper’s magic settled over him. “Yeah, he’s not bad, I guess.”

Juniper laughed. “And here I thought it was George that made Vasili so aggressively unimpressed.”

“George? Vasili?! He’s here? Where-” Terenti was cut off by a red blur of magic that solidified into Vasili with a screeching crack of bone.

“You’re alive, you bastard!” Vasili shouted. All of his marks were glowing, reflecting red light off the bronze falcon that sat on his shoulder, grooming itself.

“Vas, I just healed him,” Juniper whined.

“Well, wait because he’s about to get a lot worse,” Vasili said, rolling up his sleeves. “Two weeks I spent thinking I’d gotten you killed, meanwhile you’re running around Thedas fucking some pathetic Dalish chit.”

Ilena shoved herself in front of Terenti, but given how aggressively she was waving her staff, it was more to fight Vasili herself than to protect him. “I am not pathetic. I am a stronger mage than-”

“What did Dawen say when you told him you got married?” Arlo asked. 

Ilena screamed, “We’re not married!”

“So you’re… not having sex with him?” Arlo asked.

Ilena screamed wordlessly and dragged her horse off in the opposite direction of the stables. Kir wanted to correct her, but decided not to when she noticed the magic crackling along her staff.

Cakara jogged up and grabbed both of Vasili’s wrists before he could punch his twin again. “That’s enough, Vas. You can beat him up later. I’m sure he’ll deserve it then, too.”

Terenti rubbed his jaw as Juniper’s magic knitted the bone back together. He gestured, a movement so offended it could only be performed by a member of human nobility, at Cakara’s right hand and the silver signet ring. “So we’re all going to make fun of my knife-ear and ignore the fact that he’s  _ actually _ married his.”

“Yes because there’s nothing to joke about when we admit our feelings,” Cakara snapped.

Despite her words, Vasili looked poleaxed. Kir was suddenly sure that Cakara hadn’t actually admitted her feelings until that moment. Her head spun with information and relationships and the soft feel of Juniper’s magic. She plucked her falcon off of Vasili’s shoulder, tucked it into her sash and turned back to the castle while the drama continued. She needed a nice, long bath to clear her head or she wouldn’t remember any of Josephine’s instructions for the Winter Palace.


	10. Chapter 10

Peacock feathers glittered on an otherwise black mask. Smooth amber and obsidian stones made up dragon scales on another. Kirtida’s palms itched with the desire to stroke every mask at the Winter Palace. Some were clever renditions of animals and most were masterworks of art and design. She would have to ask Juniper to make her one once they returned to Skyhold. The bronze falcon took incredible skill to make. If he turned that to a mask-

“Oy, Kir, watch where you’re going,” Vasili said after he crashed into her. He was without his ring - might never take it back from Cakara, really, and his ears had fresh piercings that glittered with garnets set in gold. The marks on his face pulsed with weak magic and he had an embroidered eyepatch over his left eye.

“Wait, what happened to your eye?” Kir bit her tongue. Surely she would have known if he’d been injured. Yes, she’d taken a few days away from the romantic drama in her Inner Circle to chat with Sera about servants in Orlais, but she hadn’t been unreachable.

Vasili lifted the eyepatch by the threaded rose on the bottom edge. A black eye with a sickly, magical, green fire stared down at her. “George is watching.”

“He can see through the eyepatch?”

“No, I’m reneging on the deal by covering it - of course he can see through the eyepatch.”

Juniper pinched the pointed tip of Vasili’s ear. “Be nice or Aky will drag you around to search the royal wing with her and then you’ll have to listen to George complain for weeks.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“He wasn’t any less insufferable when he was Wisdom,” Juniper said. He put his hand on Kir’s shoulder. “How are you holding up? I saw your dance with the Grand Duchess.”

“I wanted to siphon all of the air out of her lungs.” Kir closed her fist over the glowing _vallaslin_ in her left palm. “She thinks she’s so much smarter than us because she’s human.”

“Nobility is the same, no matter the race, Kir. It’ll be good to remember that when Aky and I are done.” He straightened and put his hand in the middle of her back. “Something’s happened, she’s calling us.”

“Is she in-” Kir cut herself off. The anchor in the heel of her hand buzzed. “There’s a rift.”

Vasili danced out of Juniper’s reach. “Hands off, Islander. I’m coming. George is already complaining, though.”

Juniper lead them through the palace as if he’d explored it himself. Kir was starting to suspect it was more than just their years together that made the couple so synchronized. They passed under some scaffolding and into a half-renovated courtyard where Aquila stood in the center of the grass, her sword drawn. The Grand Duchess stood on a second floor balcony and waved a white, silk fan at her neck.

“Of course, I knew the Inquisitor was just a puppet for-”

“Shut it, _shem_! I’m in charge here!” Kir shouted as she ran out. She stopped next to Aquila and thrust her hand at the dormant rift. It tore open with a screech of sundered air and demons spat out into the courtyard.

The crystals in Kir’s focusing bracelet flared to life. She crossed her arms at the wrist and activated the _vallaslin_ in both palms. Wind swirled and lashed around her, launching the demons into reach of Aquila and Vasili’s swords. Behind her, Juniper chanted and spun magic that locked their human enemies in place. They pulled at their legs until their hose ripped and still their feet refused to budge. Through the dust and leaves kicked up by Kir’s magic, she saw the Grand Duchess return to the ballroom.

When Aquila shouted “Now!” Kir dropped the Wind magic and activated the spell anchored in her hand. It felt like a sharp pull on her soul to close the rift, but it didn’t hurt the way it used to. She gasped for breath and instinctively went to brush flyaway hairs out of her face, but Josephine’s own magic of Orlesian oils and shampoos was stronger than her magic and everything was in place.

“To the ballroom,” Aquila said. She kept talking as they rushed through the halls. “I have enough blackmail to bring them to their knees, but I don’t think it’s enough to fix this disaster of a country.”

“It’s not enough to save Celene?” Kir asked.

“She burned down the alienage here. We’ll discuss it with the others.”

The words echoed in Kir’s head as she revealed Florianne as the assassin. The outcry was like so much white noise in her ears. Over and over, Josephine had insisted that they needed Celene alive, that she was the only one who could rule Orlais peacefully. Peacefully! Kir wanted to laugh, wanted to cry. Of course the _shem_ s wouldn’t consider violence against elves. She didn’t pay attention to what anyone was saying until she was safely ensconced in an anteroom with Aquila, Juniper and the advisors.

Aquila shook her head and cut Leliana off. “I wouldn’t trust any of this lot to run a household, let alone half the South. Briala isn’t enough leverage, even if she were intelligent enough, it’s not so easy to throw off the shackles of servitude.”

“Be that as it may, Orlais thrown into chaos only serves Corypheus. We cannot simply appoint our own ruler,” Josephine said.

“And why not?” Juniper interjected. “We can just anchor an illusion on someone so they appear to be Celene or Gaspard. Sokolov’s ring passed scrutiny in Tevinter. No one will question it here.”

Josephine stood speechless for a moment, a hand over her heart. “That is simply-”

Aquila cut her off, though her tone was cold and even, without a hint of anger. “Speak to us of wrong and right only when your people have been burned alive in their homes, Ambassador.”

“The alienage was a tragedy, but what you are suggesting-”

“We would be justified suggesting an ‘Exalted March’ against the humans.”

Kir rubbed her temple and tugged on Juniper’s sleeve. “Do you have another pair of message sending cases?”

The others stilled to listen to the exchange. Juniper raised his eyebrows. “Yes. What did you have in mind?”

“It’ll be hard for Briala, but better Celene than Gaspard on the throne. We need to weaken the chevaliers. We give her a message case and she reports everything to us. If she can’t hold her ground, then we take more drastic steps. I hate this country, but my first responsibility is Corypheus.”

Aquila hugged Kir’s shoulders in silent agreement as she stared down the humans, daring them to protest.

“I suppose that is… acceptable.”

“And in the end, we gave you the decision, Kirtida,” Leliana said.

“Then let’s tell them how things are going to be.”

\---

Both of Thedas’ moons lit the sands in the Western Approach. The bulk of the Inquisition’s forces would be arriving at Adamant Fortress with the siege engines. Kirtida rode ahead to meet with Hawke’s Warden contacts. Leliana had taken only Varric with her when she investigated the aptly-named Ritual Tower and discovered the nature of Corypheus’ demon army.

Cakara snored against Vasili’s back. Kir had questioned why she didn’t have her own mount, but Cakara’s vague claims of still being bad at riding weren’t the real reason. Vasili made a show of scoffing at every particularly loud snore, but out of the corner of her eye, Kir caught him squeezing her wrists.

Varric rode at the back of the party, writing notes and flirting with both Scout Captain Danvers and Scout Harding. Kir thought Harding was a better match. Danvers was too surly and too poor of a shot, despite her rank. Or maybe that’s why she _was_ captain. Better at managing than at actually scouting? It would make sense.

Only Garrett Hawke’s piebald gelding walked with Kir’s hart.

“I read Tale of the Champion - well, most of it - and the only Warden you knew was Anders. How did you end up having contacts with the Wardens?” she asked.

He scratched his beard. “Let me guess: you skipped the expedition?”

A flush warmed Kir’s cheeks. “I don’t really like caves. Especially not after falling in that mine at Haven.”

“Carver got infected by Darkspawn. Anders convinced some Marcher Wardens to Join him, but he’s a prat, my brother.” Garrett chuckled. “Once he was done with his ran training, he skeeved off to work for Commander Cousland.”

Kir’s eyes went wide and she had to rub out the advantageous sand. “The Hero of Ferelden?”

“The one and only.” He laughed from the pit of his belly, waking Cakara for a moment. “Unfortunately for him, she’s an even bigger hardass than Stroud. Drags him around by the ear the way Beth used to.” He leaned back in his saddle and looked up at the moons. “They’re good for him. I can’t imagine Carver as a sailor.”

“You aren’t worried about losing him to Corypheus?” Kir bit her lip, thinking about her clan and how they refused to sit in Skyhold and tend refugees when they could help with scouting and fighting.

“There’s no power in here, the Fade or the Void that could take over that kid. Or if they did, he’d complain so much they begged for freedom from him within a day.”

Even in the low light of the moons, Kir could see the worry pulling at the edges of Garrett’s mouth and creasing his forehead. She pretended not to and forced out a laugh. “I’m surprised the Commander puts up with him. Leliana said she abandoned her responsibilities as soon as she could.”

“Abandoned is such a harsh word. She recruits. I mean, she must have sent back five whole candidates in the last ten years.” Garrett looked over at her and grinned. “Nah, I think she and her husband like having Ferelden company to bitch about Orlais with. They make ‘im wash the mabari and paint the kaddis.”

“Kaddis?”

“The special war paint mabari wear. I think it’s poisonous. Not as much as vitaar, of course, that wouldn’t be good for the dogs, but, you know, enough you want the freshie to handle it.”

“They sound like an interesting group. I wish we’d met under better circumstances.”

“Story of my life, Inquisitor.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Warden contact Elissa is the HOF from my story [Humility](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16256870). It is not required reading.

It was early morning, but the sun in the Western Approach baked Kirtida and her companions inside of their layers. Between his life in Tevinter and George’s magic, Vasili showed no discomfort. Always his match, Cakara with her island upbringing and supernatural regenerative abilities gesticulated without strain. Kir grew up on the Silent Plains and her clothing was designed to wick away sweat and block direct rays, but she had spent the last few years in the Free Marches and several months in Skyhold. Varric faired little better, his shirt stretched even further open than usual.

“I see the heat’s done half of Corypheus’ work for him,” Warden Commander Elissa Cousland said. In the midst of the desert, she wore full Grey Warden armor and regalia with a heavy, dark-blue tabard between her chainmail and armor plates. Her husband stood at her shoulder. Nathaniel Howe wore the bare minimum armor and a drop of sweat was making its way down his nose. It had a way to go.

“That’s not very nice, Lissy-”

“Commander.”

Garrett continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted, “We’re all here for the same reason.”

“To fight the Blighted magister you released,” Nathaniel said.

“Hey now, the holding spells were weakening - that’s why I got dragged into it in the first place. Corypheus would have made it out on his own.” Garrett shrugged and turn to stroke his gelding’s neck.

“In a few years when it wouldn’t have been my problem,” Elissa groused. She held out her right hand to Kirtida. “Warden Commander Elissa Cousland.”

Kir shook her hand. “Kirtida Lavellan, Second of Clan Lavellan.”

“And leader of the Inquisition,” Varric added.

“I take it Leliana accurately reported what happened at the Ritual Tower?”

“Warden Mages coerced into slaughtering their fellows to summon demons and then the summoning ritual bound them to Corypheus?”

Elissa nodded and glanced over her shoulder in the direction of Adamant Fortress. “Blighted Orlesian idiots got a little scared of the Calling and fell to their knees to pledge their loyalty to the first half-wit to offer a solution.”

“And you can’t countermand them?”

“Clarel or the magister or both has them convinced I’m an idiot dog-lord who got two kings killed before falling ass-first into stopping the Arch-demon.” Elissa sneered and spat into the sand. “As if it’s not their fault Blighted MacTir turned them away at the border.”

Kir couldn’t make sense of what Elissa was saying. The details of the Fifth Blight were hazy and Leliana had done little to clear them up, instead directing Kir to ask Maryden to sing the songs as if they were accurate accounts.

“Where’s Carver?”

“Busy,” Nathaniel said at the same time Elissa replied, “Warden business.”

Garrett narrowed his eyes and leaned in. The blood-red crystal in the head of his staff glowed. “I asked where my brother was, not for excuses.”

Elissa was unmoved by the intimidation. She met Garrett’s eyes without blinking or bowing. “Grey Warden Carver Hawke is on assignment for Warden Commander Cousland. We answer to no power in Thedas, Lord Amell.”

Garrett’s nostrils flared at the title, but before he could issue another threat Cakara stepped in front of him and put a hand on his chest. 

She smiled at the Wardens. “He’s babysitting, isn’t he?”

Daggers appeared in Elissa’s hands as if by magic. “What did you just say?”

“He’s got the dogs, too, I bet. There’re sticky, little handprints on the bottom of your tabard.” She pointed to their horses. “Your saddle’s modified to carry someone in front of you and you left the dog leashes with the rest of your tack. Plus you both did the whole protective parent answer at the same time, thing. And he keeps glancing around at knee-height like he’s looking for someone.”

The Wardens relaxed by inches, but Elissa’s jaw remained firmly clenched even after she sheathed her daggers. “After your debacle in the Vinmark Mountains, Carver is particularly weak to Corypheus’ influence. I deemed it best if he returned to the Marches to look after our base of operations.”

Nathaniel put a hand on his wife’s shoulder. He sighed. “Yes, Hawke, he’s babysitting.”

“See? That wasn’t so hard, now was it?”

“Watch your mouth or you’ll get the rest of the report with a vial of magebane in your gullet.”

\---

Rubble flew in every direction as Kirtida sealed the rift behind them. Gravity had no power over the crumbled stone in the Fade. She stood on a small piece of black Fade stone that floated perpendicular to the large, hewn path before them. Aquila was the only one who stood on the large mass. The blade of her ironbark sword glowed a light, icy blue before she stabbed it into the rock under her feet. Air and magic burst out from the puncture point and grabbed the rock formations suspended in the air and dragged them into ground near her.

When the magic and dust settled, the pommel stone in her sword was still glowing. She reached up for her helmet, but it was gone. With a sigh, Aquila pulled her braid out of her cuirass and threw it over her shoulder. “Quick thinking, Kir. Good job.”

“I… Thank you. It was just. Instinct.” Kir hopped off of her stone and felt around the larger one with her feet. She looked around at the eerie, green sky and black, floating formations. “Are we… In the Fade? Physically?”

“Yes,” Cakara said, though her voice cracked into a squeak halfway through. She had both hands on Vasili’s left arm, fingers clenched so tight it looked like her knuckles were about to pop out of her skin. Her white irises glowed with magic. Her throat bobbed with a dry swallow. “Shouldn’t George be here?”

Garrett scratched his beard, the only one as nonplussed as Aquilla. He glanced over his shoulder at Vasili and Cakara. “That’s your demon, right? Should be here. Justice was with us the last time we were in the Fade, right Varric?”

“You didn’t have to remind me,” Varric bit out through gritted teeth.

“Excuse you,” Vasili said. “I’m a  _ maleficar. _ Not an abomination. George is in his own domain. Probably polishing his crown.”

“I imagine it’s an actual crown,” Aquila said. She laughed at Varric’s horrified face. “Come now. I’m sure you’ve heard worse.”

“We’ll talk about it over drinks later, eh? Hey Wings, can you open us up a way out?”

“Technically, yes, but it’s more likely the rift will open inside a wall or a soldier.” Aquila strode forward with her shield on her arm and her sword in hand, though both were lowered.

“What?!” Kir lowered her left hand and held it against her chest.

“Distances and directions are…” Cakara took a shuddering breath, as if she were cold. “Fucked in the Fade.”

Garrett prodded a rock suspended in the air with his staff. The rock wobbled and floated off. “More than just those, I’d say. Either way, if we can’t open a fresh one, that lackwit Erimond had a rift in the Great Hall.” He pointed ahead to a great distortion in the mottled sky. “Distances may be fucky, but that’s relatively close enough, I’d say.” 

“We can leave nothing to chance in the Fade.” Aquila held her sword up pommel first and whispered a spell over the pommel stone. The light inside sharpened, crackling into lightning that sparked against the crystal. She blinked her eyes and they glowed even brighter than Cakara’s. Her head lolled on her neck, swaying as if her neck was boneless. The whispering stopped and she came back to herself. “Yes. That’s the one. I could see it.”

“You could  _ see _ it?” Vasili asked, dragging Cakara forward. “You know a spell to see the physical world from the Fade?”

Aquila turned her head, but not enough to look at him. Her voice was clipped and cold. “I know spells for a great many things. Cakara!” Aquila commanded Cakara in elvhen, but not with any words that Kir knew.

Cakara’s daggers hissed in the Fade’s humid, choking air. One sizzled red and angry while the other left icy fog off into the air. She glanced at Vasili, but was able to stand on her own. “Yes, Elder.”

Garrett walked at Aquila’s flank, his staff loose in his right hand. Though his gait and expression were light and casual, his head tilts let him examine the terrain and search for dangers. The lackadaisical swinging of his staff boxed Kir and Varric in between the pairs of him and Aquila and Vasili and Cakara. No one had said a word; they had simply fallen into the protective formation. Fire flared on Garrett’s focusing crystal as he and Aquila turned a corner. “If Mother appears, I’m legally allowed to leave.”

Kir peeked between their armor, but didn’t recognize the old Chantry woman in front of them. Vasili and Cakara shrugged at her when Kir glanced in their direction.

“Who are you?” Aquila asked.

“I am here to help,” the image said.

“She’s appearing as the late Divine,” Garrett said.

“I don’t trust spirits that say they want to help. Spirits aren’t interested in mortals and demons aren’t interested in helping,” Cakara said.

“The kid wants to-”

Kir pushed between Aquila and Garrett and held up her hand. “You can say what you want, but we’re not making any deals, so if that’s what you’re here for, you’re wasting your time.” The  _ vallaslin _ on her palms itched, but she ignored it and the magic spinning in her focusing bracelet.

“Corypheus sure has a lot of demons at his disposal,” Garrett said.

“I am not a demon,” it said. “This realm is owned by the Nightmare. How Corypheus enthralls other demons, I do not know, but the Nightmare serves willingly.”

“The Nightmare,” Aquila said, tasting the name. She repeated it in Elvhen.

“Why would it serve him?” Kir asked.

“He is one of the magisters that started the Blight, no? It has grown fat on the fear of ages.”

“Is he truly one of those magisters?” Aquila asked. Something about the air around her changed… It darkened or… thickened. Kir couldn’t place it. Her voice was cold when she continued. “Did they even start the Blight?”

The image of Justinia focused on Kir. “It took memories from you when you entered the Fade at the Conclave. You must retrieve them if you are to escape this place.”

“Of course it disappears without answering the pertinent questions,” Garrett said.

“It’s a spirit. Whether or not it’s infused with Justinia’s soul is irrelevant. I asked it questions outside its scope. It can only follow its purpose… Whatever that may be.” Aquila raised her shield. “Let’s proceed with caution.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some spider imagery in the second section, sorry! Also very mild gore.

“If that spirit really wanted to help, why couldn’t it tell us more? I don’t understand.” Kirtida asked. Though the ground appeared to be stone, it squished and slorped around her feet. She spun Wind magic through her focusing crystals, but it did nothing to harden the ground.

“Demons know only as much as they’ve learned. Or absorbed,” Vasili said. His marks flashed, but the red glow did little to cancel out the green miasma. “George says that was Piety.”

A blast of ice magic shot from Aquila’s sword and exploded against a black, rock wall. She bared her teeth and hissed through them. “Piety. No wonder it said Tevinter started the Blight.”

Garrett raised a hand and stopped walking. “Are you saying that Tevinter didn’t?”

“Whether or not we need Kir’s memories, we must pass through this demon’s realm. We can all have a nice history lesson when we’re back in Skyhold.”

“No reason to get snippy with-”

Cakara clapped her hand over Vasili’s mouth before he could finish his sentence. “Shut up. She’s never been this angry in my entire life. I know you’re too human to see magic properly, but now is not the time for this.”

Vasili glared at her, but said nothing when she removed her hand.

“What do you say, Wings?”

Kir glanced around and everyone was staring at her. “Oh. Right. Yes, we should keep going. If we find the memories, we find them. If we don’t, it doesn’t matter. We need to get back to Adamant. The dragon-”

“Juniper can handle the dragon. Focus on us. Thoughts have power here,” Aquila said.

“The trick with the rocks when we arrived… Are you a  _ somniari _ ?” Hawke asked as they moved forward. No one else’s footsteps squelched the way Kir’s did.

“I imagine that word has a more specific meaning than its translation, but either way, it’s more complicated than that. Concentrate on your power and your strength. It’s only as real as you believe it to be.” Before anyone could ask for clarification, Aquila leapt at a ghoul, her sword freezing the wisps of magic solid before tearing them to shreds. Green tendrils fell to the ground where they dissipated. 

Vasili charged after her, a blazing, red counterpoint to Aquila’s cold blue. Kir crossed her wrists in front of her chest, palms out,  _ vallaslin _ flashing, before sweeping her arms out. Combined Wind and Force magic billowed out and swept the demons onto her friends’ blades. Cakara dashed between and around Vasili and Aquila’s swords, unaffected by Kir’s Wind or Garrett’s Lightning. Her skin glowed where the magic touched it.

Varric guarded Kir’s back as they made their way to join the melee fighters. When the last of the demon essence dissipated, the image of Justinia reappeared. The moment it opened its mouth, Aquila howled with so much magic that the guise dissolved and all that remained was a floating, white spirit. She clapped the flat of her sword against her shield and shouted in Elvhen until the spirit vanished.

“...Did she just curse June?” Kir whispered to Cakara.

“Told him to live eternally starved, parched and hearing the wails of dead babies,” Cakara replied with eyes wide. Her skin still glowed with absorbed magic that cast twisted shadows on everyone’s armor.

“Ah, we have a visitor. Some foolish little girl comes to steal the fear I kindly lifted from her shoulders. You should have thanked me and your fear where it lay… Forgotten.” The Nightmare’s voice rattled and echoed inside of Kir’s skull.

Right hand fisted and raised, Kir shouted back into the sky, “I am the Lorekeeper of Clan Lavellan. I choose what we forget!”

“Then why is it you were sent away at such a pivotal time?”

Hawke spit off the path. “I see it’s started its little game with us.”

Despair demons mixed with fearlings appeared in lieu of a verbal response. The group moved forward by inches, cutting their path with steel, magic and the occasional crossbow bolt. When they refused to bow, the Nightmare continued its taunts.

“Once again Hawke is in danger because of you, Varric. You found the Red Lyrium, you brought Hawke here…”

“Just keep talking, Smiley,” Varric replied over the twang of Bianca’s mechanisms.

“What will you do when this one leaves? Too elf for Tevinter, too Tevinter for the Dalish. All alone without a place in the world.” The Nightmare cooed the last words as if Vasili were a skittish dog.

“Bold of you to think George will let her leave,” Vasili said as he cleaved a despair demon in half lengthwise.

“And you, Hawke? Did you think you mattered? No one knows the name of your city, let alone that you failed to save it. And your little Admiral of No One is one squall away from nothingness.”

Garrett paused, Lightning in hand and put his left hand on his hip. “When Isabela hears about this, I’m going to pretend I don’t know you; is that alright?” He threw the Lightning to the ground and sizzled through the remaining demons.

Kir skirted around piles of ichor as she collected the glowing, green wisps that lingered in the area. With magic and, probably unnecessary, hand-waving she herded them toward Aquila. Without sheathing her sword, Aquila scooped the wisps up with her shield. Her lips moved, but no sound left them. The spell distorted the air and forced the wisps to coalesce into a single, blue glow. 

She offered the shield to Kir. “I’ve removed the demon’s touch. The essence feels like you, but it is still your choice.”

“How do I…?”

“Just touch it.”

\---

The memory overwhelmed the senses. The green, hazy sky disappeared: replaced by a stone-walled room. Four Grey Wardens in full, formal regalia stood, one at each of the cardinal directions. In the center was Divine Justinia, her arms bound in red chains of magic. The red color of the magic swirled with a viscous, black ichor: blood magic. She struggled against the unnatural bonds and turned to her captors. “Why are you doing this? You, of all people?”

Corypheus’ gross, grating, inhuman voice cut through hers. “Keep the sacrifice still.” He held out a ball. It was black, with swirling lines like a fingerprint cut into the surface. It crackled with green Rift magic. The closer he brought it to the Divine, the more the magic sparked. 

She cried for help as the magic began to push and pull at her chest, the struggle visible even to those unable to see magic.

The only doors to the room opened with a crash that was nearly drowned by the crackling magic. Kirtida ran through them. “What’s going on here?” Magic was spinning in her bracelets before the Divine batted the orb from Corypheus’ hand. Kir dove to the floor to catch it, her magic pushing it into her hand. 

And then everything exploded.

Kir gasped for breath as the memory released her. She clutched Varric’s shoulders to stay on her feet. Everything Corypheus said at Haven made sense. She’d interrupted his ritual to anchor the spell. The Anchor would have given Corypheus free passage into the Fade: the thing he’d conspired with the other ancient magisters to gain. Free passage and power. There was no denying the massive store of magic the orb had left in Kir. When her vision cleared, she looked at the others.

Cakara was waving her hand in front of Vasili’s face - she may not have even seen it, with her resistance. Vasili swatted her hand out of the air and looked her over for injuries. Hawke was muttering to himself about Wardens ruining everything and Varric was mostly concerned with Kir’s condition, silently offering her the waterskin on his belt. But Aquila…

The anger and hatred that had tensed her mouth and pulled at her eyes was gone. Her face was as emotionless and regal as the ancient statues of Mythal. Though there was no movement in the air, Aquila’s cape flowed and snapped around her ankles. Frozen gasps of air rose from the cracked ground under her bare feet. She turned her head, but not enough to look at any of them. “Let’s end this. I have more pressing business to attend to.”

“What could possibly be more pressing?” died unvoiced in Kir’s throat. She nodded, unseen and pushed off of Varric. She pushed the waterskin away. “Thanks I’m fine.”

The Nightmare was unmoved by Kir’s recovery of her memories and continued its onslaught. “What good is a guardian that cannot even look at her charge?”

Without hesitation, Cakara lunged into the next wave of demons. She left the Despair demons and fearlings to the others and focused her daggers on a spindly Terror demon. “I’ve never been afraid of demons. And that includes you.”

“Of course not. It’s not what comes out that scares you; it’s what you abandoned inside.”

Something in the Nightmare’s retort froze her faster than Aquila’s magic. A second terror demon appeared under her feet and speared Cakara through the back with a spider-like appendage. Vasili howled and the magic burned Kir’s skin as well as dissolved the terror demons. The glow from his blood pact marks didn’t fade as he flashed next to her and picked up Cakara before her body could even go limp. He breathed out slowly, as if he were a child trying to make his breath fog, but instead of an icy cloud, a red mist left his mouth and sank into the wound in Cakara’s chest. The bleeding stopped, but aside from the soft rise and fall of her breathing, she didn’t move.

“Fear,” Aquila said, her voice as cold and unwavering as her locked expression. “I thought we were old friends playing a game. Is this what you do after coming so far?”

The Nightmare laughed. “And you came to be so full of fear, Arthiel. How far Andruil’s general has fallen.”

Blinded by tears, Kir was so overwhelmed her knees buckled again. Choking on half a sob, she stumbled over to Vasili so she could feel the rise and fall of Cakara’s chest for herself. The  _ vallaslin _ on her forehead, unique and dormant, itched and burned at the demon’s words. It couldn’t be possible. None of this was real. It couldn’t be. The Creators were gone, locked away by Fen’harel.

“You know better than to threaten something a mortal loves, Fear.”

“You’ve never been mortal.”

“Nor have you, yet we can both die.” She raised her chin and the pure magic of the Fade itself made an unearthly glow halo her face. “You saw me threaten the humans with an Exalted March of the Dalish. You can release the Wardens and your pet demons and perhaps live to glut on the fear of every human in Thedas.” She raised her sword and it grew with icy magic. “Or you can perish here.”

The great, undulating, spider body of the Nightmare demon paused. Its two front legs tapped the ground as it considered the offer. Its fangs retracted into its chelicera, which it clacked together. The oppressive heaviness in the air faded and the clacking sound was… plain and clear. Like a child smacking sticks together as it debated dropping them for a treat. Also absent was a ghostly moaning Kir hadn’t noticed until it was gone. Even Cakara’s wound seemed less severe.

“I have better things to do, Fear.” Aquila took a step and the ground froze and cracked with a hiss of cold air. “Your petty game with this magister is at its end. Whisper the true fear of my coming to him, if it pleases you, but you serve me now.”

Arthiel’s  _ vallaslin _ burned themselves across the Nightmare’s head, searing many of its eyes shut. It lowered itself in a bow. “Your way is clear, my lady. You will feed me well.”


	13. Chapter 13

At the edge of the Inquisition encampment, soft music drifted amid the groans of the healing and the dying. With the help of her magic, Kirtida followed the music to Cakara’s strange bird-shaped music box. It rested on her chest and she rested on Vasili’s. Cakara was asleep: breathing even and unlabored. Vasili stroked her hair under the moonlight.

“How is she?” Kir asked.

“Fine. Already back to complaining about the food. George said the wound… It wasn’t really real.” Vasili narrowed his eyes and shook his head. “Because it was incurred and healed both in the Fade it doesn’t count. There’s no scarring; it doesn’t hurt. She’s just tired.”

“I wouldn’t… Think that’s how it works.” Kir twisted her bracelets around her wrist. “We were there physically. It wasn’t just a dream. How could it not be real?”

“George says that’s just the way it is. More importantly, how can Aquila be an elven god?”

Kir rubbed the back of her neck. “I was looking for her, actually. A soldier said they saw her and Juniper- Is he June?”

“Who?”

“You don’t- The god of crafting. How do you not know?”

Vasili rolled his eyes. “I’ve only known I’m elfblooded for a few months. It didn’t come with full knowledge of Dalish culture. And I’m certainly not going to make a deal with George for it. He hasn’t stopped being pleased with himself since I found out.” He squeezed Cakara’s shoulders. “Obviously he knew before this idiot told me.”

“But how could you not know? Did you really never remove your ring?” Kir sat on a box near their bedroll. The top had been cracked open and was uneven, but it was better than standing.

“Do you ever remove your bracelets?”

Kir opened her mouth, but closed it without saying. She twisted her bracelets around her wrist. “I guess not. But it’s my magic focus.”

“And the signet rings supposedly gave us access to power stored by the family. We don’t have a legacy to speak of. We should have known there was something else to it.” Vasili rubbed his cheek against the top of Cakara’s head. “For all his faults, Father is a great illusionist.” He stared past Kir at one of the torches. Muscle by muscle, his mouth pulled into a frown and a wrinkle formed between his eyebrows. “You know… He might not actually be as incompetent as we thought.”

Kir put her elbows on her knees and propped her chin on her hands. “That’s good, though, isn’t it?”

Vasili looked away from her eyes and scratched his goatee. “I… Well, perhaps. It means we treated him unfairly.”

A smile pulled at Kir’s face. “That’s what children are for.”

Vasili snorted. “You were looking for Aquila, weren’t you?”

After straightening her back, Kir nodded. “Yes. I want to know if she really is… Arthiel.”

“She only branded the Nightmare with her  _ vallaslin. _ I think it’s pretty clear.”

“Vas.”

“She and Juniper took Solas out into the desert. None of them looked happy.”

“You didn’t follow them?”

Vasili pointedly looked down at Cakara in his arms before turning back to Kir. “I don’t speak Elvhen and George is insufferable when I ask him to translate.”

“I wonder what Solas has to do with anything.” Kir shoved her hands into her sash.

“He must be from the old empire, too, since they knew him before Amorgos.”

“I…” Kir remembered Juniper greeting Solas like an old friend when they first arrived at Skyhold. The memory was so clear she could see her hart’s antlers in front of her. “Oh. Oh, you’re right, aren’t you? Oh dear.”

\---

Far from the Inquisition encampment at Adamant Fortress, on the leeside of a tall dune, Aquila and Juniper lead a select group. Aquila raised a hand to stop everyone. Without any other cue, she thrust out the glowing, magical pommel stone on her sword in unison with Juniper swinging his staff forward. The sand roiled like boiling water before coalescing into bricks that shifted and slid into the shape of an amphitheater. They stepped onto the stage and gestured for everyone to sit. A glittering, translucent dome of magic closed them in, sapping the heat out of the air and off their skin.

The Iron Bull’s face was as still and hard as stone when he sat in the back row. His eye never left the two ancient mages for more than an instant. His nostrils flared when the dome formed overhead. He stuck his mangled hand through the barrier a few times before sitting still.

Kirtida squeezed herself between Arlo and his ‘cousin’ to give Ilena a break from his enthusiastic affection. Vasili and Cakara sat separate from the others; even if her injury had disappeared, Vasili was wont to let anyone too close to her. Terenti moaned under his breath about why he had to go out in the middle of the day and why were the knife-ears showing off and couldn’t they have at least brought some wine. Varric had half a page of notes written on the event and his pen dashed across the paper with black footprints. Hawke remained standing at his shoulder.

Aquila stood with her chin raised and every line of her body screaming command like an ancient statue. Her words spilled off the stage like the hushed opening to a story designed to frighten children. “Solas has left the Inquisition. He committed a crime for which no amends can be made. If you see him, do not take his life. Death is now a kindness he does not deserve.”

“Shit,” Varric and The Iron Bull said at the same time.

Leliana held her chin. “What has he done?”

“Nothing within the scope of the Inquisition,” Juniper said, the words clanging against the stage like the slamming of a metal door.

“You may have heard from those that joined us in the Fade that the Fear demon addressed me as Arthiel. It is true. That is a name given to me a long time ago.” Aquila lifted her left hand and Kir’s bronze falcon squirmed its way out of her sash before flying to land on her fingers. “I was inducted into the ranks of those the Dalish now call the Creators.”

Ilena hissed in a breath at the same time that Kir gasped. She had heard it first-hand in the Fade, but for Aquila to admit it was something else. The  _ vallaslin _ felt tight on her forehead. The image of the Nightmare demon with the same marks branded onto its head flashed before her eyes. She looked to her falcon to clear the image, but that just fished a nagging question from the pit of her stomach. “Are- Are you June?” For who else could craft such a glorious creature from metal?

Juniper huffed a laugh and looked down, even as he held Aquila’s arm. When he raised his eyes, they blazed with magical fire. “That could not be further from the truth. I was a slave to them. It was Aky who gave me the power of creation.”

Aquila’s marble facade shifted long enough for her to give her husband a loving look, complete with hooded eyes and a secret smile, before locking her expression in cool disinterest. “Corypheus is a trifling issue; the rifts less so. Once they have been dealt with, Juniper and I will free the People from oppression. It would be for the best if you chose now what side of history you will be on.”

Terenti leaned back, propping himself up on his palms. “So what did you do to the old egg head that makes death such a mercy?”

“I removed his ability to use magic without the barbarity of the Chantry’s Tranquilization. He retains his mind and freewill and the unquenchable thirst to use power forever out of his reach,” Juniper said.

Terenti fell off the back of his seat. Ilena made no move to help him up.

Hawke leaned on his staff. “So what you’re saying is you’re the gods Corypheus sees himself as.”

“I am no god,” Aquila said, daggers cutting into her words. “I am a mother tired of seeing children sacrificed on the altars of greed, fear and  _ pride. _ Never again. No slavery, no Circles-”

“Let me guess,” The Iron Bull drawled, “No Qun?”

Juniper lifted his chin, the soft, affectionate persona falling away. “The possibility of ferality and madness was put in your heart by words, not blood,  _ imekari. _ No one should suffer those fears. We won’t let the verbal poison continue.”

“And the Maker?” Leliana asked, her own voice bared fangs.

“If your Maker can love with the carrot and not the stick, there may be a place for them in Thedas.” Aquila sniffed. “But I would not bet my life on that if. Gods have never been kind to Thedosians.”


	14. Chapter 14

“I haven’t reported about your rather… extensive history, ma’am.”

Kirtida glanced over her shoulder at Aquila, but her lips were quirked in a smile and she had an eyebrow raised. Something about the hazy mist on the Storm Coast made Aquila’s hair shine red in the sunlight.

“And why not?”

“You don’t sound surprised,” The Iron Bull said.

“Little surprises me anymore, but continue.” Aquila shared a glance with Juniper and they touched hands.

“A elven goddess running around Thedas changes things. A lot of things. It’s information you can’t trust to paper.”

“Of course.”

The conversation unsettled Kirtida. The Iron Bull and Aquila both spoke with so many layers it was impossible for her to understand what they really meant. Aquila thought he had another reason for withholding the report, but despite the obvious implication, he didn’t refute the challenge. The potential alliance with the Qun had caught him flat-footed, even if Kir had no intention of agreeing. She’d stop the Red Lyrium shipment, but that would be the end of it.

They climbed to the top of the hill and The Iron Bull looked around. His gaze paused a few times, seeing things significant only to him. “All right, our Qunari contact should be here to meet us.”

An elf with Dalish-style armor walked into view. “He is. Good to see you again, Hissrad.”

Kir didn’t like him. Something about the tension in his jaw and the set in his shoulders raised her defenses. He reminded her of the surly, old Keepers that would spit in their fervor to correct her about Arthiel.

“Gatt! Last I heard, you were still in Seheron!”

“They finally decided I’d calmed down enough to go back out into the world,” Gatt replied. His words did nothing to change Kir’s initial impression. At this distance, she could see that though his armor and weapons were Dalish in design, the materials were wrong. Just slightly the wrong colors. It had to be intentional: some psychological trick to unbalance the Dalish and make them question their own thoughts while the Qunari did and took what they wanted.

The Iron Bull didn’t hesitate before introducing Kir, or even glance at Aquila, not that she had expected to give away something so blatantly. “Boss, this is Gatt. We worked together in Seheron.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Inquisitor. Hissrad’s reports say you’re doing good work.”

Kir nodded. “I’m doing only what I can.”

Gatt made a sound of agreement, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “We’re in it together now. The Tevinter Imperium is bad enough without the influence of this Venatori cult. If this new form of lyrium helps them seize power in Tevinter, the war with Qunanadar could get worse.”

The hair on the back of Kir’s neck stood on end. The Qun didn’t consider the fighting with Tevinter a war. The Iron Bull had made it clear it was a petty squabble, at most. She’d trusted Aquila’s warnings, but Kir hadn’t thought she’d be able to see through the subterfuge herself.

“With this stuff, the Vints could make their slaves into an army of magical freaks. We could lose Seheron… and see a giant Tevinter army come marching back down here.”

Kir looked at Aquila as The Iron Bull spoke, trying to gauge her reaction to him taking the bait, but Aquila and Juniper’s faces were bored. They spoke Elvhen with a thick Amorgan dialect and gestured between each other, as if not even listening. Her anxiety increased as Gatt explained the plan. It was such an obvious setup, but The Iron Bull didn’t call it out. Was he so deep in denial? Was it because he thought Gatt was a friend? He called Gatt by a nickname, but the familiarity wasn’t returned. It made her heart hurt. She balled her hands into fists when The Iron Bull said that he’d never liked covering dreadnought runs. Could the operation be any more designed to test him?

“It’ll be fine, Kir,” Aquila said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

She tried to let the words reassure her as Gatt pointed out that the Chargers had the ‘easier’ target. The target with an imminent ambush, more like. Her eyes stung. She liked Krem and Dalish and, and all of them. And if Aquila was right? The betrayal would hurt The Iron Bull. She hadn’t had an opinion on the Qun before, but now she hated them.

The Venatori forces fell easily, even though Aquila and Juniper fought with only the smallest fraction of their power. Kir left her own magic swirling in the air to keep from screaming as Gatt signaled the dreadnought. Only one volley hit the smugglers’ ship before the Venatori ambush appeared, weapons drawn on the Chargers.

“Crap,” The Iron Bull said. Desperation pulled at his eye and he touched his eyepatch before turning to Aquila. “I’m sorry, ma’am.”

She patted him on the shoulder and then stepped up to the edge of the cliff. She drew her sword and pointed the blade at the ambush. Daggers of ice formed in the air before piercing the Venatori. They slumped in place: dead instantly.

“ _What?!_ ” Gatt screamed, his voice cracking on the word. He cursed in the Qunari language.

Without a word, Aquila turned her sword to the ships. Icebergs shot out of the water, piercing the hulls and tearing both ships in half. The surface of the water froze around them and shot outward in every direction, sealing off any hope of escape. Then, she turned to Gatt, grabbed him by the collar and held him over the cliff. “Bull is my son now, little backstabber. Run to your masters and slobber at their feet to tell them that he failed your loyalty test.”

“What kind of _bas-saarebas_ are you?!”

Aquila’s hand glowed red with magic that spread to encompass Gatt’s face. He screamed, but she was unmoved. “I am the inspiration behind every call to freedom. I am what the Qun fears most: creativity incarnate. It is only out of Bulls affection for you that that creativity doesn’t sunder your flesh from your bones in ways you cannot imagine, chained as your mind is. You won’t remember what I’ve done here. You will remember only that Bull is no longer one of yours… And this fear.”

She threw him to the side like a ragdoll. Aquila turned her head slightly.

“The others remember nothing, as well.”

Kir jumped at Juniper’s words. The his eyes glowed with the same purple light as his magical focus. She glanced at Bull; he had paled until his skin looked like Cakara’s and his cheek was wet. His hands shook as he hung his axe in the harness on his back.

“... Thank you, ma’am.”

Aquila pulled on his shoulders until he leaned down enough for her to hug. “You’re welcome, dear. You deserve better than that. Hopefully the Qun’s reaction to this brings your friend to his senses.”

With stiff, mechanical movements, The Iron Bull closed his eye and returned the hug.

\---

Josephine and Cullen shifted their weight from foot to foot and struggled to look directly at Aquila or Juniper. Leliana was only betrayed by the tense muscles around her eyes and the twitch in her jaw. The humans had been nervous about Aquila and Juniper’s plans to free the People from oppression, but whispers from Adamant were nothing compared to spies seeing Aquila’s magic with their own eyes. Cullen knew Kirtida had never been fond of him and was the most anxious of all. There was a tremble in his voice when he spoke. “Corypheus has moved all of his forces South to the Arbor Wilds.”

Leliana nodded. “He’s been searching elven ruins since Haven, but what he hopes to find, we do not know.”

“Which should surprise no one,” the twiggy, black-haired, _shem_ mage whose name Kir couldn’t remember said. “Fortunately, I can assist.”

Aquila and Juniper didn’t share a glance; instead, they touched hands under the table. Both wore polite expressions with a neutral set to their mouths and no creases in their brows. Kir envied the control. She’d already rolled her eyes three times. She cleared her throat. “I’m listening.”

“What Corypheus seeks in the forest is as ancient as it is dangerous.”

Kir was proud of herself for not tapping her foot. “Which is?”

“‘Tis best if I show you.”

Either the mage missed the exasperated sigh, or she didn’t care. Kir looked over her shoulder when Juniper put a comforting hand on her back and gave him a wane smile. He made himself go cross-eyed and pursed his lips like a fish. Stifling a giggle, Kir followed the human mage into a storeroom.

“An Eluvian,” Aquila said, the words falling hollow and flat onto the stone floor.

The mage jerked back and stared at Aquila and Juniper, as if seeing them for the first time. Her eyes went up and down their armor and uncertainty pulled at the corners of her mouth.

Juniper ran a hand down the gilded frame. Bronze magic arced from his hand to the frame. He wrinkled his nose. “It’s a simple one. Destination can’t be changed.”

“Let me guess,” Aquila said, “It goes to the Way Space.”

“Way Space?” Juniper asked.

“How would you translate it, then?”

“Way point-”

“It’s not exactly a point, is it?”

“You know of the Crossroads?” the human interrupted.

Kir choked back another laugh at Aquila and Juniper’s expressions. She’d made the same one herself many times around humans. It spoke directly to her soul. ‘That’s a good idea, but I don’t like you, so I don’t like it.’

“We are familiar with the place that lies beyond, yes,” Aquila said. “Are you suggesting that Corypheus wants… an Eluvian?” She raised both eyebrows and looked down her nose.

“Yes.” The human straightened her back and walked up to the Eluvian. “The space between the Crossroads and the Fade is narrower than from the mortal world.”

“If all he wants is entry to the Fade, he can simply walk in through any of the rifts scattered across the South. And at the Winter Palace that Grand Duchess said he placed the rift in the courtyard. If he can make a rift whenever he pleases, why bother with an Eluvian?”

“I… Do not know. But one lays in the Arbor Wilds, untouched in a Temple of Mythal. The defenses proved too perilous for me alone to traverse.”

Aquila tapped her bottom lip. “If I recall correctly, that one can be redirected, but it wasn’t made with Amorgan glass, so he wouldn’t be able to channel raw Fade through it.” She frowned and stared at the Eluvian without seeing it. “I suppose he might think the Well is useful. I can’t remember anything else of note in that temple.”

“You have… Been to the Temple of Mythal?”

“I’ve been a lot of places, _shemlen._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have Strong Feelings about "Demands of the Qun."


	15. Chapter 15

The closer they came to the Temple of Mythal, the more magic choked the air. Kirtida had wondered how such a lush forest could exist so far South, but it seemed Mythal’s magic lingered. It slurped across her skin like honey, the feeling lingering even when she passed through the ghost of it. She glanced around her companions, but only Ilena showed any unease and hers manifested very differently. Kir tugged on Juniper’s sleeve, but before she could say anything, he spoke first.

“Oh. I see. I should have known. We’ll have to address it later.” He put the heel of his palm on her forehead and a white shimmer of magic skipped down her, taking the itchy, wet feeling of the magic with it. He crossed through the group and reached for Ilena, but she dodged away and blocked his hand with her staff.

“I’m fine.”

“You flinch at the breeze, Ghilenan. Either you let me ward you or you return and wait with the Inquisition’s forces.”

She flinched at the use of her full name. Ilena bared her teeth at Juniper, but lowered her staff. She squeezed her eyes tight against the wash of protective magic and then shoved Terenti to walk between her and Juniper.

Kir turned to Cakara and tripped over a root. Cakara was glowing like Luna on a full moon and seemed completely unaware as she glanced around the woods. Even her wooden bo staff glittered with latent magic that spilled from her hands. She turned and noticed Kir’s wide eyes. She lifted one of her arms and shrugged. “This? There’s a lot of magic in the air.”

“I can feel it,” Kir said. “Does that… Happen a lot?”

“Every time I go up on the Mirror Plateau back home. It’s not a big deal. Even after the Cataclysm, magic isn’t as rare or special as these Southern humans want to believe.”

Kir would have questioned her more, but Aquila chuckled. Aquila was… was Arthiel. A circlet of gold and silver wound in and out of her hair. The device on her shield was replaced with a raptor in dive clashing with a stylized fox, magic exploding from where they met. Her cloak was light blue and dropped snowflakes in her wake. Translucent, blue, Amorgan glass gilded her armor. Just looking at Aquila made Kir’s  _ vallaslin _ feel like her mother’s touch just before sleep.

Aquila held up her right hand in a fist. “Something’s not right here.”

“We are nearly upon the Temple of Mythal,” Morrigan said. Juniper had made her learn the human’s name, saying that she had to be polite, even to idiots.

“Yeah, we can tell,” Terenti drawled.

“Not now, children,” Aquila said. The silence following her words broke with a Red Templar flying out of the trees to crash into the river ford. Arrows sprouted from his chest and an elf in strange, clinging armor dashed out of the trees to slit the downed Templar’s throat. The elf returned to the trees with a flash. “This shouldn’t be.”

As one, she and Juniper walked at twice their earlier pace. The magical focus in his staff glowed with such a bright, orange light that it tinted his robes. “Forget Corypheus, we need to know how this is possible.”

Kir could barely keep pace. “What’s going on? What’s so upsetting about that elf?”

They broke into the trees and into a second glade. In every direction, Red Templars made combat with elves in the same, strange armor as the first. All bore Mythal’s  _ vallaslin _ and weapons that glittered with magic. An elf finished off a Red Templar and sprinted towards them. Magic swirled in Kir’s palms, ready to defend, but Juniper stopped her with a dispel and hand on her arm. He shook his head. “Brace yourself, little one.”

Aquila drew her sword, enchantments and magic swirling along the blade. It crashed against her shield and rang like a thousand Chantry bells. She threw her arms to either side and arched her neck in a wordless shout, but the sound that came from her mouth was a falcon’s hunting cry. 

The  _ vallaslin _ on Kir’s forehead and cheeks burned and pulled at her entire body. Her feet lifted of their own accord and she shambled toward Aquila like the undead at Crestwood. With a groan, she fell to her knees as the compulsion faded. “What’s going on?”

Juniper knelt and held her shoulders, but didn’t answer. He watched the elf that had been running toward them, now frozen mid-step. The muscles in his face bulged as he fought Aquila’s magic, making his eyes wild.

Aquila spoke in elvhen, words like icicles falling from a roof’s edge.

“It’s beneath me to look at you,” Cakara translated in a whisper. She swallowed visibly. “Be gone or be dust. I care for your master only.”

The elf fell to the ground, body contorting as he tried to sprint away before making contact. His gait stuttered and skipped.

Kir bit her lip and used Juniper’s help to get to her feet. “What is this?”

Aquila sheathed her sword. She looked ten feet tall. “These…” She hesitated, thinking, but in the end did not choose a word for the elves they saw. “These could not exist if Mythal was dead. The Cataclysm, everything, was caused by her murder. If she lives now? Unsealed? While our People suffer day and night? Much is wrong in Thedas.”

\---

“Kir!”

Kirtida screamed, ducked and crossed her wrists, defensive magic spinning from her palms. She peeked through the magic and saw Vasili, marks lit, holding his sword against the ‘assailant’s’ throat.

Arlo yelped and arched away from the blade, the edges of his neck flickering as his magic worked overtime to protect him. He waved and spoke with a tiny voice. “Hi?”

“What are you doing here?” Cakara asked.

“Trying to get killed, obviously,” Terenti said.

“Vaharel, you were instructed to stay with Briala,” Aquila said without looking at him.

Arlo shrank, his head sinking into his chest like a turtle. He blinked and struggled to look at Aquila, as if she were the sun. “Sorry, ma’am. When the shadow elves stopped attacking us and focused on the Red Templars, I thought it would be better to help Kir.”

“In war, it is best to be predictable to your allies. If I had not recognized the feel of your magic, you would be dead.” She turned her head, but not enough to see him. “You cannot always rely on your magic to save you.”

Arlo ducked behind Kir and nodded without a word.

The party continued in silence until they turned a bend and saw Red Templars ahead, locked in combat with the elves as Corypheus himself strode forward unimpeded. 

“We’re about to enter Mythal’s sanctum,” Juniper said, as if Corypheus wasn’t even there, let alone in magic range. “Do not wander off. Do not touch anything. Do not cast magic. Do not insult Mythal lest Aky be compelled to punish you. No one wants that to happen.”

Ilena’s hands were bone-white where they clenched her staff. Her lower lip trembled and she couldn’t bring herself to look at Aquila.

Heedless of the warnings behind handed out, Corypheus continued his ponderous way forward. Only the magical gateway slow his approach. Green magic that crackled like lightning bound him in place and tore the flesh from his bones and Red Lyrium calcifications. He howled like a Hunger demon as his body deteriorated. With a final burst of magic, the wardstones shattered and Corypheus’ ashes fell to the ground with a soft woosh. The shockwave knocked out most of his men, though Samson and a handful of Red Templars sprinted across the bridge, unaffected by their master’s death.

Aquila stepped over the stunned soldiers as if they were nothing, her footsteps leaving slippery patches of ice in her wake. Juniper followed, neither of them sparing a single or word for Corypheus’ ashes. Only Cakara was brave enough to speak after the earlier warnings. “Is it… over? Just like that?”

“His presence lingers,” Juniper said. “I imagine he’ll possess another of his people soon enough.”

“Like a demon?” Kir asked.

“As Cole should have taught you, the line between person and spirit is far less defined than the Veil would have you believe.”

Halfway across the bridge, a horrible, gurgling, crunching sound assaulted Kir. She could feel it in her magic and looked over her shoulder at the source. A Warden rose from the ground, as if lifted by a meat hook in his chest. His arms flailed with a crack-snap of bones and his armor melted off him like hot slag. The screech of the false arch demon drowned out the sound of flesh dripping off his contorting face.

Aquila turned her head. “Love?”

“Of course.” Juniper answered. “Everyone else, keep following Aky. I’ll send Corypheus off to be dealt with later.” He strode back through the group, magic catching the edges of his robes and making them snap behind him like in a harsh wind. The crystal in his staff glowed as he raised both arms up. Complicated syllables from neither Elvhen nor Trade slipped off his tongue and glittering blades of light swarmed through the air like hornets. He threw both arms forward and the blades flew at Corypheus’ half-formed body and the false dragon.

The dragon screamed and rolled through the air, but it wasn’t enough to keep the blades from drawing black blood. It grabbed Corypheus in its claws and beat its torn wings against the sharp air to escape.


	16. Chapter 16

Magic burst up from the ground and lit Ilena from below. She froze in place, hand outstretched toward a pylon covered in Elvhen writing. All color drained out of her face. “I didn’t mean to-”

“You idiot, you’re going to get-” Terenti choked as Vasili jerked him back by the collar of his robes.

“Don’t make it worse by touching her, stupid.”

Morrigan peeked between the twins to read the pylon herself. “ _Abelasan_ meaning the place of sorrows. You mentioned a well at Skyhold and Samson said ‘the Well of Sorrows.’ This could be of what he spoke.”

“I was reading that!” Ilena’s annoyance at Morrigan overcame her fear. “The stupid vines are in the way. ‘If you seek knowledge… Are respectful and pure…’”

“You can keep trying,” Cakara said, “or you could get out of the way and let one of the three people who can actually read it fluently try.”

“Children,” Aquila said, freezing the lot of them solid. Even Kirtida and Arlo, who hadn’t done anything, hid behind Juniper lest they draw her ire. “Ilena, you stand on the supplicants’ path. We bow our heads to no one.”

Juniper grabbed Ilena’s waist and lifted her straight up, setting her on the ground next to Morrigan. The magic faded from the tile. He herded everyone away from it, though Ilena and Morrigan kept craning their necks to look at the writing.

To spare them the strain, Kir asked, “What is the Well?”

Magic churned quietly under their feet and followed along the walls with every step Aquila walked. She ignored the Red Templars felled by Elvhen arrows and took the stairs with icy footsteps. A double door towered over even Aquila, but swung open at her approach, pulled back by magic heralding her. An explosion crashed over the soft whisper of magic. Kir had only just realized that Samson and his Red Templars had blown a hole in the floor when a wall of ice coalesced in front of them, trapping them in.

“You’re a shadow of the past, just like these temple guardians. You cannot stop me,” Samson roared. He drew his sword, as corrupted with Red Lyrium as he, and pointed it at Aquila. “Kill them all.”

Fog erupted from Aquila’s feet, making her cloak billow behind her and covering Samson’s Red Templars with hoar frost. Kir and her companions stood in the circle of Juniper’s protective magic as Arthiel strode across the hall. Some of the Templars were too far gone with Red Lyrium corruption and charged her only to find their boots frozen to the floor and hands matted with ice.

“I was chosen by Corypheus twice. First to be his general and now to be his vessel. I will bring him the Well and he will be able to walk the Fade without the Anchor your pet Inquisitor stole from him,” Samson blustered.

“I have no interest in the Well of Sorrows.” With each of Arthiel’s words, a chunk of frost shattered, sundering the armor and flesh held within. She didn’t seem to hear the screams that curdled Kir’s blood. “I came only to send a message.”

Icicles formed in the air and ended the suffering of every, last Red Templar. Samson stood alone in his walking fortress. The Red Lyrium kept Arthiel’s fog from taking hold, for the moment.

“What do you want?” Fear dripped from his voice like tears.

“It is not for you or your magister.” Arthiel’s steps echoed in the frozen silence. No one else’s did, even as Juniper escorted everyone across the hall. She touched her wall of ice and it collapsed in a thundering cascade. The hole Samson and his men had created was sealed. She ignored it and strode deeper into the temple. A second set of double doors barred the way. These did not open until she drew her sword.

Inside the chamber, Elvhen warriors, all bearing Mythal’s _vallaslin,_ stood at attention, though none dared to aim a weapon at Arthiel. Their leader stood at the top of two curved staircases. With a puff of smoke, he vanished only to reappear, kneeling, at her feet. “Our Lady is not present, General.”

“I know.” Aquila sheathed her sword and then touched his cheek. “You may rise. What is your name?”

“Abelas.”

Aquila turned her head to the side. “I see. What is your charge?”

“To defend the Temple and the _vir’abelasan._ We wake only when intruders approach. Each time there are fewer and fewer of us.”

The way he stared at Aquila, leaning slightly forward, wild desperation in his eyes, only half-hidden by the monotone of his responses, pierced Kir’s heart. Something was wrong about it. Very wrong. There was no pride or duty in his stance. Not even acceptance of the burden. Kir felt a ghost of the earlier compulsion pull at her muscles. Darting her gaze around the chamber, she saw that every one of the warriors held the same stance. Their matching armor and _vallaslin_ suddenly felt less like a uniform and more like…

“Has she come to you? Even once since the horrid Veil sapped color from the world?”

“No, General.”

A flicker of emotion crossed his face: the corners of his eyes and mouth turning down, brows coming together, lower lip trembling. It flashed across his fellows in the room like a wave at sea.

Aquila cupped both of his cheeks. “I’m so sorry.” She kissed his forehead and Mythal’s tree disappeared, dissolving like a broken spell.

Abelas coughed out a sob. Tears flooded his eyes. “ _Ma serannas._ ”

And then he, too, dissolved.

\---

One by one, the warriors approached Aquila, gave their names, received a kiss and dissolved. Time lost meaning as they streamed in from all over the Temple. Kirtida shook like a leaf as she watched, Arlo touching her back, wishing he could help. Ilena was still pale as Cakara and clinging to Terenti. Cakara herself had her head bent toward Vasili and the two of them whispered together. Samson had followed them from the hall and stood next to Morrigan, both humans horrified with wide-eyes, tense jaws and hands that couldn’t decide whether or not to clench.

When there were none left to approach her, Aquila fell to her knees and sobbed. Juniper knelt at her side and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, speaking quiet words of reassurance. He pressed their foreheads together and his magic glowed around them.

Ilena threw Terenti away and took a step toward them. “What happened? Why did you remove their _vallaslin_? What gave you the right to remove their devotion?” Her words clattered and clanged like discordant notes.

Cakara took her arm and held her back. “Ilena, not now.”

“Yes, now! She doesn’t just get to walk out of the Fade, tell us she’s a _goddess_ and then kill all of Mythal’s priests!”

“You don’t want to know the truth,” Vasili said.

Tears streamed down her face. “I need it!”

With a sigh, Cakara turned away, unable to look Ilena in the eyes. “The reason _vallaslin_ are taboo on Amorgos is because… because they were originally slave brands. Not marks of devotion.”

“You’re lying,” Ilena shouted. “If that were true- No, you would have said something earlier. She would have said something earlier!”

Kir took both of Ilena’s hands in hers. “Because no one has the right to take the meaning out of our rituals. No one has the right to-”

Ilena thrashed like a caged lion and snarled, showing her teeth. “Take them off! I won’t be chained! Not by the _shems_ and not by- by Ghilen’nain!” She rounded on Terenti. “Get rid of them!”

“I don’t-”

“So ask a demon!”

Vasili shoved his way between them. “I’ll do it.” Green fire burned inside his pupils. “George knows how to remove them.” He chanted in a guttural, inhuman language, red mist swirling around him. He passed Terenti a dagger and he cut open the back of his arm without instruction. The chanting continued, his brother’s blood hovering in the air before it stabbed Ilena’s face and back like a thousand needles. She howled, spine contorting, but when she looked up, her face was free of any marks.

“Juniper told you no magic,” Aquila said. Her skin was pale and tight on her face. Tears continued to wet her cheeks, but she ignored them, pulling Ilena into a hug and stroking her hair. “Kir is right. I did my best to protect you from this. I’m sorry I didn’t do better. But come, we shouldn’t linger here.” She pressed her forehead to Ilena’s before pulling away.

In the soft, shuddering silence, Aquila lead them through the Temple. Her cloak no longer sprinkled frost in her wake. She and Juniper held each other as they lead the way, the youthful joy and vigor spilled from their faces to mix with the ashes of Mythal’s freed slaves. It was only in the open courtyard, where the setting sun gave color to everyone’s faces, that Morrigan dared speak with a voice as thin as vellum. “What then, is the Well of Sorrows?”

“Mythal’s avatar was ever a dragon, sitting on her hoard of souls.”

Samson stepped onto the platform, only to fall, his armor screeching against the tiles. “The cries! Stop them! Save them! End it! End it!”

Aquila turned one hand palm up and gestured to the pool. “Have it, then, _shemlen._ Your prize. The collected wealth of knowledge of the Elvhen Empire, stored in the souls that discovered it. Take it within you and suffer an endless undeath here when your body fades.”

“That’s enough!” Kir cried, spinning her magic around Samson. She couldn’t recreate Juniper’s barrier, but hopefully the wind could drown out the voices of the lost. “There’s been enough suffering!”

A blue-white bubble of magic wrapped around Samson like a blanket and his writhing stilled. Juniper lowered his staff. “She’s right. Let’s leave this tomb.”

“Will not Corypheus return and simply take the Well now that it is unguarded?” Morrigan said, words stumbling and jumping, as if afraid to leave her mouth.

“He may not know the exact geas of the Well, but he fears it, or he would not have sent Samson. But he is welcome to it. The knowledge he seeks does not exist. Not in Mythal’s hoard, nowhere.” Aquila walked past the pool, the Eluvian behind it lighting at her approach. “We all need a long rest.” She stepped through it.

The setting sun was warm, but did nothing for the chill in their hearts as they shuffled after her through the glass. Kir hung back, hesitating. Samson was only just returning to his feet. She paused with her hand on the gilded frame. “Maddox… He set a fire, trying to protect the secrets of your armor.”

He hunched over, as if a dagger had just been pulled from his chest. Still, he chuckled. “I told him not to.”

“I know. He said that when we rescued him. He’s still recovering from his burns. Aq- They think they can bring him back to himself. It won’t be… fast, but you gave him agency. A Tranquil. You… deserve to see him recover, even if you’ll have to be in chains.”

“You’d let me into your stronghold, Inquisitor? Corypheus’ chosen?”

“Dagna - my arcanist - she said that no matter your lyrium tolerance, you can’t have long to live. You and Maddox both deserve for you to be by his side now.”

Samson’s laugh was like breaking glass. “Then I am at your mercy, Inquisitor.”


	17. Chapter 17

Thump, thump, thump, crash! Kirtida and Arlo opened the door to the Herald’s Rest a crack and peeked through the gap. Krem held a tankard upside down and was scolding The Iron Bull, who didn’t seem to notice him. The Iron Bull’s eye was closed and every muscle on his face was slack. Aquila stood behind his chair, sleeves rolled up to her elbows as she applied a thick, white cream to his horns. His leg jutted up and into the table every so often and he sounded like nothing more than a purring cat.

Kir pushed through the door and wove her way through the crowd. There were empty seats next to both Cakara and Ilena, but she didn’t trust them to not get loud at the slightest, or in Ilena’s case no, provocation. Cakara was alone, drinking wine and playing the soft song from her music box. Ilena and Terenti had their table covered in papers and magic detritus and had some spell winding up between them. It was both bad manners and dangerous, but after the Temple of Mythal, Kir wouldn’t stir up any trouble for them. Ilena’s bare forehead still felt like a slap in the face.

Arlo dragged her to sit between Juniper and The Iron Bull, Krem having wandered off for more ale. He flickered visibly in his seat until Juniper touched his shoulder and his shape solidified and his eyes turned yellow. “Thanks, Uncle. Trying to control it’s been making it worse.”

“A bit, but better control is necessary. Especially if you want to learn shapeshifting.” Juniper winked at him.

“I want to be a tiger.” Arlo raised his hands, fingers bent like claws.

Aquila laughed. “You don’t quite get to pick your form so easily. You have to study the shape for years and, judging by your drawings, you’ll need longer than most.”

“Hey!”

“Don’t talk back to your mother, kid,” The Iron Bull said, his voice drowsy and content.

“You’re just cross because you can’t tie me up,” Arlo said. He crossed his arms over his chest and pouted.

The Iron Bull cracked his eye open. “I only tie up people that want it.” Three different people in the tavern - a woman and two men, all redheads - gasped, blushed and were suddenly very busy not looking at him.

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“He’s not talking about tying up bandits,” Kir said.

“Kirtida!”

“Dorian, we’ve already had this conversation.” Kir sighed dramatically, but then laughed and held his hands in greeting.

“I know my darling friend, but I have to tweak your ears every now and then.” He pulled up a chair behind Kir and tilted his head back to watch Aquila. “And what’s going on here?”

“Bull was itchy, so Juniper mixed up some horn balm for him,” Aquila said. She had long since finished covering the horns, but Kir agreed The Iron Bull needed the opportunity to really relax.

“He said it was impossible to get outside of Seheron. I’ve never had a challenge thrown so blatantly my way in my life,” Juniper said. The smile lines around his eyes popped, even though he kept his mouth straight. The kindness in his face sent Kir back to that day in the musty, old library. He’d claimed to be no good at herbalism, but here they were. She smiled and met his eyes. He winked.

The comfortable conversation was shattered by Cakara’s shout. She’d stood up at her seat and Vasili was across from her, a plate of green slime sloshed between them. “What in the barren lands is this slop supposed to be?”

“Wow, rude,” Vasili said. He pushed the plate closer to her and some of the slime dripped onto the table. “For someone who grew up with such scarcity, you’d think you’d appreciate a gift of food a little more.”

“This isn’t food! This is… Paint? I don’t even know.” She shoved it back at him and it sloshed over the side.

“It’s red mash. I made it just for you.”

Cakara flipped the plate at him, coating his armor with the green much. “It’s not even red, you idiot!”

“What is wrong with you? I’m going to need a bath now.” Vasili shuddered and sloughed off as much as he could with his hands. He made his way toward the door. “And how was I supposed to know?”

Cakara followed him. “You look at it. You know, with your eyes!”

Kir bit the heel of her hand to keep from laughing aloud, but tears of mirth burned her eyes. The moment the door closed behind them, silence took the tavern… Then uproarious laughter. Kir and Arlo clung to each other, gasping for air.

“I don’t want to know what he made,” Aquila said. “Red bean doesn’t even grow off of Amorgos.”

\---

It was anticlimactic, really, when Corypheus reopened the Breach. The shards of earth floating in the air had nothing on the black rocks of the Fade. His dragon’s screams were cries, knowing that Juniper’s magic was coming for it. It should have felt like an ending, but as Kirtida raced up to meet him, she felt only annoyance. He knew it was over. Why not sulk in some pit until Aquila and Juniper’s revolution unwittingly stumbled over him and destroyed him once and for all? Kir has plans: big plans.

All of the Inner Circle followed Kir to the confrontation, even members Josephine forced on her and whom she spoke to as little as possible, like Vivienne and Blackwall. But Kir wouldn’t tell them to go back. Vivienne, at least, was important to the _shem_ s. They could have a partial victory here before Aquila taught them that if their countries couldn’t survive without slave labor, they wouldn’t survive at all. The future burned in her chest. Collecting stories and heroes was good, important work, but she had the chance to bring her people more than stories. She could bring them the equality they deserved.

Magic spun out of her _vallaslin_ and billowed around her. Corypheus launched bursts of magic at them, but Kir deflected them with her dispelling wind. Her father had told her it was impossible to carry a dispel on any other magic, but Juniper and Aquila’s thousands of years of practice knew better. As they climbed after Corypheus, Kir’s magic provided cover for Juniper to finish off the dragon.

He summons the same magic blades he used at the Temple of Mythal. They glittered in the sky and grew as they passed through Fade leaking from the Breach. With his eyes on the dragon, he followed the feel of Aquila in front of him. Like at the Temple, she was dressed in full Arthiel regalia, foregoing her helmet in favor of a mass of complex braids hiding her undercut. Her ice pierced the summoned demons like swords. She didn’t slow her pace or even look at the demons to wield her magic.

Even knowing what Aquila could do, Kir bit her lip and strained to keep the defences strong. She didn’t breathe easily until the dragon’s death wail nearly deafened her. Juniper touched her back. “Just keep it up for now. Don’t close the Breach until Aquila gives you the signal. We may need the extra power from the Fade to fully destroy him.”

“I’ll hold it as long as I can.”

“You’ll be fine.” He pressed a rejuvenation spell into her before removing his hand. He walked at Aquila’s shoulder. As one, their eyes glowed brighter and brighter until they were just pure lights: green and blue respectively.

It unsettled Kir, who did her best not to look. She locked her gaze on Corypheus and started predicting his magic strikes. The annoyance returned, coiling in her chest. Couldn’t he just die?

At the summit, Aquila wasted no words on him. Ice crawled over his corrupted, deformed body, locking his limbs in place. He howled, cursing in ancient Tevene, but the sound was lost as Juniper’s magic formed a bubble around him. Green mist circled inside the bubble like marsh gas. It closed over Corypheus until it only barely held his body. Meanwhile, Aquila’s ice bit deeper into what flesh he had left. His jaw tore from the vitriol behind his screams. They continued until, like at the Temple wardstones, his body died in a burst of black sludge.

But it was trapped in Juniper’s spell, unable to seek out another tainted creature. In the mist, Kir saw the ghost of a spindly old man, back bent from years of study. He clawed at the bubble, but the ice came for him, still, freezing and cracking even his incorporeal form. Kir felt sick and turned away. She pointed her left hand at the Breach and let the feel of the Anchor take over her senses. After a wet _pop!_ Aquila shouted for her to seal the Breach.

And just like that.

It was over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _"And just like that it's over. We tend to our wounded, remove our dead."_
> 
> Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this cathartic experience of The Elves Fucking Win For Once. There will be a short sequel covering the, much different, events of Trespasser and then this story will go into hibernation until DA4 comes out.
> 
> I've decided not to write the "missing scenes" of events that Kir was not present for, but you're welcome to request short bites over on [Tumblr](https://tk-duveraun.tumblr.com/ask) if there's something you're dying to see.
> 
> After the Trespasser bit, the next DA fic is going to be Female!Surana/Awakening!Anders, soulmate identifying marks AU. Look for it!


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